Purpose This paper stems from a 12-month collaborative enquiry between a group of Syrian academics in exile in Turkey and academics from the University of Cambridge into the state of Syrian Higher Education after the onset of the conflict in 2011. The purpose of this paper is to draw on 19 open-ended interviews with exiled Syrian academics; two focus groups; mapping and timeline exercises; and 117 interviews collected remotely by collaborating Syrian academics with former colleagues and students who were still living inside Syria at the time of data collection. The findings of the research suggest that Syrian HE after 2011 was fragmented across regions; in some cases non-existent, and in others deemed to be in a state of reform in order to meet student needs. Key issues that emerged from this work are human rights’ abuses directed against academics and students including the detainment, purging and kidnapping of academics, an increased militarisation of university life and a substantive loss of academic and human capital. Design/methodology/approach The overall design involved two workshops held in Turkey (in June and July, 2017) at which the Cambridge team explained the stages of undertaking qualitative research and planned the collaborative enquiry with Syrian co-researchers. The first workshop addressed the nature of qualitative research and explored the proposed methods of interviewing, using timelines and mapping. The instruments for interviewing were constructed in groups together and mapping was undertaken with the 21 Syrian academics in exile who attended the workshop. Syrian academics also built their own research plans as a way of expanding the consultation dimension of this project inside Syria, engaged in survey and interview protocol planning and discussed ways to access needed documentation which could be drawn upon to enrich the project. The Syrian co-researchers interviewed remotely HE staff and students who had remained in, or recently left, Syria; the key criterion for group or participant selection was that they had recent and relevant experience of Syrian HE. The second workshop focused on data analysis and writing up. There was also wide consultation with participants inside and outside Syria. As part of the research, the Cambridge team conducted open-ended interviews with 19 Syrian academics and students living in exile in Turkey. This involved interviewing Syrian scholars about their experiences of HE, policy changes over time and their experiences of displacement. The researchers developed this protocol prior to the capacity-building workshops based on previous research experience on academic and student displacement, alongside extensive preparation on the conditions of Syrian HE, conflict and displacement. In addition to interviewing, a pivotal element of methodological rigour was that the authors sought to member check what participants were learning through mapping and timeline exercises and extensive note-taking throughout both workshops. The major issues that the authors confronted were ethical concerns around confidentiality, the need to ensure rigourously the protection of all participants’ anonymity and to be extremely mindful of the political sensitivity of issues when interviewing participants who may not feel able to fully trust “outsider” researchers. Issues of social trust have been reported in the literature as one of the most significant drawbacks in conducting research in “conflict environments” (see Cohen and Arieli, 2011) where academics and students have been working and/or studying in autocratic regimes or were operating within political contexts where being open or critical of any form of institutional life such as university work or the nation could cost them their jobs or their lives. Findings The accounts of Syrian academics and students emerging from this work point to some of the state-building expressions of HE manifested in the shaping of professional and personal experiences, the condition and status of HE, its spatial arrangements and their associated power formations, and resulting in feelings of intense personal and professional insecurity among Syrian scholars and students since 2011. While acknowledging that the Syrian situation is deemed one of the worst humanitarian crises in the region in recent decades, these accounts resonate, if in different ways, with other studies of academics and students who have experienced highly centralised and autocratic states and tightly regulated HE governance regimes (Barakat and Milton, 2015; Mazawi, 2011). Originality/value Currently, there is virtually no research on the status and conditions of higher education in Syria as a consequence of the war, which commenced in 2011. This work presents a first-person perspective from Syrian academics and students on the state of HE since the onset of the conflict. The major contribution of this work is the identification of key factors shaping conflict and division in HE, alongside the political economies of HE destruction which are unique to the Syrian war and longstanding forms of authoritarian state governance.

中文翻译：

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冲突，不安全感和高等教育的政治经济

目的本文源于一群在土耳其流亡的叙利亚学者与剑桥大学的学者在2011年冲突爆发后进行的为期12个月的合作调查。本文的目的是：对流亡的叙利亚学者进行19次不限成员名额采访；两个焦点小组；制图和时间表练习；叙利亚学者与收集数据时仍住在叙利亚境内的前同事和学生合作，远程收集了117个访谈。研究结果表明，2011年之后的叙利亚高等教育在各地区之间是零散的。在某些情况下不存在，而在另一些情况下则处于为了满足学生需求而处于改革中的状态。这项工作中出现的关键问题是对学者和学生的侵犯人权行为，包括拘留，清洗和绑架学者，大学生活日益军事化以及学术和人力资本的大量损失。设计/方法论/方法总体设计涉及在土耳其（2017年6月和2017年7月）举行的两个讲习班，剑桥团队解释了定性研究的阶段并计划了与叙利亚共同研究人员的合作调查。第一个研讨会讨论了定性研究的本质，并使用时间表和地图探讨了拟议的采访方法。访谈的工具是分小组建造的，与参加讲习班的21名叙利亚流亡学者进行了地图绘制。叙利亚学者还制定了自己的研究计划，以扩大该项目在叙利亚内部的咨询范围，参与调查和访谈协议的规划，并讨论了获取所需文档的方法，这些文档可用来丰富该项目。叙利亚的共同研究人员远程采访了留在叙利亚或最近离开叙利亚的高等教育人员和学生。选择小组或参与者的关键标准是他们具有叙利亚高等教育的最新经验。第二个研讨会的重点是数据分析和编写。叙利亚境内外的与会者也进行了广泛的协商。作为研究的一部分，剑桥团队对19名叙利亚流亡土耳其的学者和学生进行了不限成员名额的采访。这涉及采访叙利亚学者，了解他们的高等教育经历，政策随时间变化以及流离失所的经历。研究人员在能力建设研讨会之前，根据先前在学术和学生流离失所方面的研究经验，以及对叙利亚高等教育，冲突和流离失所条件的广泛准备，制定了该协议。除了采访之外，方法严谨性的一个关键因素是作者试图通过制图和时间表练习以及整个两个研讨会的广泛笔记来检查参加者正在学习什么。作者面临的主要问题是关于机密性的道德问题，在采访可能无法完全信任“局外人”研究人员的参与者时，需要严格确保保护所有参与者的匿名性，并特别注意问题的政治敏感性。文献报道社会信任问题是在“冲突环境”中进行研究的最重大缺陷之一（参见Cohen和Arieli，2011年），那里的学者和学生已在独裁政权下工作或/或在专制制度下工作。在政治环境中，对大学工作或国家等任何形式的机构生活持开放或批评态度可能会使他们丧命或丧命。调查结果从这项工作中涌现出来的叙利亚学者和学生的叙述指出了高等教育的一些国家建设表达，这些形式体现在专业和个人经验的塑造，高等教育的条件和地位，其空间安排及其相关的权力形成，以及自2011年以来，这种情况导致叙利亚学者和学生感到强烈的人身和专业不安全感。尽管承认叙利亚局势被认为是该地区近几十年来最严重的人道主义危机之一，但如果以不同的方式，这些说法会引起其他研究的共鸣经历了高度集权和专制国家并严格监管高等教育管理体制的学者和学生（Barakat和Milton，2015； Mazawi，2011）。创意/价值目前，自2011年开始的战争以来，几乎没有关于叙利亚高等教育状况和条件的研究。这项工作提出了叙利亚学者和学生对高等教育开始以来的第一人称视角。冲突。这项工作的主要贡献在于，确定了构成高等学校冲突和分裂的关键因素，以及叙利亚战争和长期的专制国家治理形式所独有的高等学校破坏的政治经济。