LINKING RESEARCH TO KAZAKHSTAN’S STRATEGIC PRIORITIES: THE CASE OF INTERNATIONAL FACULTY AT NAZARBAYEV UNIVERSITY

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the extent to which international faculty in a non-Western country align their research output to the research priorities determined by the government. To address the research purpose, we used content analysis method. The study relied on secondary publication data from abstracts of articles published by NU international faculty in peer-reviewed journals included in the Thompson Reuters’ Web of Science. The results of the content analysis revealed that international faculty from NU largely produce research relevant to the country’s needs. This is particularly typical of researchers in sciences whose research generally aligned to the country’s research priorities; meanwhile, researchers in social sciences and humanities produce a greater number of irrelevant articles in their total number of publications. Several possible explanations for the revealed results were discussed. This study attempts to provide a comprehensive picture on the role of NU and its international faculty in pursuing the country’s needs.