Neo-academic Cold War is closing the door to global science

America’s war of choice with Iran is yet another geopolitical event eroding international alliances, cooperation and institutions while deepening geopolitical, economic and military rivalries. The world has entered a new kind of Cold War and, with it, a neo-academic Cold War.

Just over two decades ago, great optimism greeted globalisation, with its supply chains, growing international collaborations between nations and an ethos of interconnectedness among the peoples of the world.

A hubristically proclaimed ‘end of history’ promised the eventual demise of autocratic governments and the ascendancy of democratic norms, open societies and open science, inextricably tied to the best aspects of globalisation.

The old bipolar Cold War alliances arrayed around the United States and the USSR – which shaped military, economic and academic interactions – seemed to have drifted into the past.

Higher education played a central role in this new and positive geopolitical narrative in the post-Cold War era. Soviet-era ideological constraints on universities, for example, receded significantly, allowing Russian academics to interact and pursue joint research projects with foreign scholars and universities – reducing, if not ending, their international isolation.

Similarly, China’s universities became cautiously more open to Western scholars and research, encouraging an increasing number of faculty and student exchanges and, eventually, research collaborations.

A more connected world

Like the emerging global economy that took shape after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the academic world became more interconnected, spurred by the power and accessibility of computing, internet communications and research networks, and a growing faith that universities played an important role in boosting national economies and fostering democratic norms.

Research universities and their academic cultures began unprecedented efforts to promote international collaboration and selected forms of integration.

These efforts included joint cross-national research projects, a surge in collaborative authorship in scholarly journals, a proliferation of new journals, the establishment of branch campuses in various parts of the world, joint degree programmes, and government-sponsored funding for scholars to visit universities outside their national boundaries.

Unprecedented numbers of students from Asia came to universities in the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union, with the largest number arriving from China and India.

Globalisation boosted the resources of higher education and led to a growing perception of its purported role as a great salve to the world’s problems.

As an indicator of the vital role of transnational research collaboration, the proportion of internationally co-authored articles in science and engineering journals grew from just 1.9% in 1970, in an era that preceded the advent of the internet, to 12.4% in 1996.

By 2023, 22.5% of all journal articles were co-authored with international collaborators. Academic researchers in the United States had an even higher level of international co-authorship, increasing from 23% to 40% during that same period.

Shifting power centres

However, this globalist vision of higher education has been unravelling – gradually, then in spurts – since the turn of this century under the weight of a growing transnational paranoia and geopolitical conflict.

A new Cold War is emerging, driven by growing geopolitical rivalries, ideological conflicts and shifting centres of political, economic and military power, fuelled in part by neo-nationalist movements and the growing number of illiberal democracies and autocracies.

Reflecting changes in the geopolitical order, the context of the neo-academic Cold War is different from the post-World War II Cold War. Previously, bipolar competition between the US and the Soviet Union for military superiority and spheres of influence included distinct scientific and academic ecosystems.

This has given way to a multipolar world in which Russia is receding in importance as it struggles for a military victory in Ukraine, China and India are rising and traditional allies have declining economic and scientific collaborations.

Multi-aligned nations, mostly in the Global South, are also playing an increasingly important role, seeking collaborations in a quest to create their own semi-autonomous science and technology ecosystems.

In turn, these geopolitical trends are shaping the evolving neo-academic Cold War. Under Trump, America is playing an outsized role in shaping its development and suffering for it.

Trump’s ‘America First’ isolationist agenda is turning away from international alliances, agreements and collaborations in favour of mercantile and foreign policy edicts focused on tariffs and protectionism.

International engagement is focused on military threats and a war with Iran, resource acquisition and support for illiberal democracies.

This adversarial worldview is having profound repercussions on America’s higher education sector and the nation’s science capabilities, including the nation’s ability to attract global talent and maintain its capacity to innovate.

Trump’s open hostility and belittling of allies, as demonstrated at the 2026 Davos World Economic Forum, and his constant complaints about the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) further erode America’s world standing. His rhetoric and actions deepen concerns about the costs and benefits of collaborating with US institutions.

Trump’s war of choice against Iran adds to America’s evolving geopolitical isolation, along with his harsh and erratic domestic policies that are anti-immigrant and anti-higher education.

Under Trump’s America, the message is not only unwelcoming of foreign talent but also a dangerous environment in which to pursue a higher education degree, seek a career or raise a family.

The Trump administration’s draconian cuts and efforts to dissolve legislatively established federal agencies are bleeding into virtually all areas of international policy, diplomacy and international relations built over decades.

The previous pattern of international collaborations and academic mobility is rapidly shifting, including a marked decline in joint projects and co-authorship between Chinese and American researchers and patterns of brain drain in the US.

But Trump is not the only contributor to this neo-academic Cold War. There is a larger geopolitical story tied to a series of global traumas that have occurred over the past two or so decades.

These traumas include the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre, a diaspora of economic and war refugees, the rise of neo-nationalism and illiberal democracies, the return of Russia and China as geopolitical adversaries to the US and the European Union, the impact of Brexit, the COVID-19 pandemic and, finally, the deleterious effects of Donald Trump’s second term as president of the United States.

A universal good no more

These shifts have fundamentally altered how governments and publics perceive the role of higher education. The net result is that scientific and cultural cooperation and science diplomacy intended to address global challenges and build international partnerships are declining as global values.

The evolving neo-academic Cold War is creating silos of transnational academic and research engagement. It features the politicisation of research funding, shifting patterns and barriers to international co-authorship and transnational research, new limits on sharing data and licensing intellectual property rights and restrictive visa policies directed at international students and faculty that are altering the flow of academic talent – potentially a tectonic shift in talent mobility.

Political pressure

While the neo-academic Cold War is evolving, there are outcomes and trends that may play out.

For one, and perhaps to state the obvious, colleges and universities increasingly operate in politically charged national and regional environments that not only compromise scientific and other research on global problems but also constrain talent mobility and data sharing, interfere with academic freedom, reduce institutional autonomy and erode public trust in universities and their academic cultures.

Whereas once, transnational engagement of scientists and their institutions was seen as a universal good, a “transnational paranoia” has now emerged.

Unlike the previous Cold War, particularly after the launch of Sputnik in 1957, in a growing number of countries, universities and their academic cultures of free inquiry and autonomy are no longer viewed as assets to be nurtured and supported in the geopolitical race for scientific and technological superiority.

China has a limited and strategic vision of purpose-driven universities that have severe restrictions on academic freedom and free speech and that must be closely regulated for fear of a return to the sedition of democracy movements like Tiananmen Square. And these controls have been extended to Hong Kong’s universities.

Four networks

A second observation is that the neo-academic Cold War is characterised by a set of emerging, siloed scientific and academic transnational networks that reflect the multipolar world of geopolitical alliances and competitors – economic and military.

Mapping this new reality is challenging as its contours are evolving, but it essentially aligns with four emerging networks.

None are totally isolated, and there is fluidity to how they are taking shape, but the trend line points toward semi-autonomous science and technology systems that erode or hinder open science and the vitality of science diplomacy.

The first network is the once dominant, but now increasingly isolated, US research community that retains a legacy of international academic engagement but is withering under the weight of political attacks and defunding.

The second network centres around China, featuring a state-directed effort to pursue a long-term agenda of scientific and technological self-reliance and domination in key areas such as renewable energy, AI and quantum computing.

China is pursuing strategic alliances largely in the Global South via its Belt and Road campaign that align with its economic interests, with Russia as a sort of vassal state and with close relations with other autocratic states like Iran and North Korea.

The third network centres around the European Union. As it faces an increasingly hostile Trump administration, Europe remains the most active in retaining and building transnational academic and research engagement with Western-aligned nations in Asia (South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and Singapore) as well as in sub-Saharan Africa, South America and increasingly India.

And a fourth emerging network is a large group of non- and multi-aligned nations. The increasingly divisive geopolitical world puts many nations in a challenging situation where they must choose sides: for example, the US versus China or buying Russia’s cheap oil despite the admonishment of Western states to end financial and diplomatic ties.

The alliance of the non- and multi-aligned

Many nations with rising standards of living and economic ambitions seek or now have neutral diplomatic positions and are building alliances among their growing numbers.

In this geopolitical story, the hegemony of scientific productivity and talent mobility of the US, the UK, Europe and now China is being eroded by national investment in universities and scientific ecosystems.

This is particularly the case among a group of nations largely in the Global South that seek selective transnational engagements. Their ambition is to find transnational collaborators when opportune among the three primary neo-academic Cold War networks (US, China, Europe) and to also seek scientific and academic engagement among themselves.

Brazil, India and South Africa (the three founding members of BRICS who have functioning democracies) are the most significant players in the multi-aligned alliance.

Their choice of scientific and technological engagement, and the flow of their students to foreign universities, is being influenced in no small part by the behaviour of Trump and his administration.

In the wake of arbitrary and vindictive tariffs by Trump and imperialistic foreign policies, Brazil, India and South Africa are essentially being pushed away from productive scientific cooperation and student exchanges with American universities. They are seeking new economic and academic alliances elsewhere.

Vietnam, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Nigeria are also seeking a path of multi-alignment to become more significant regional hubs in attracting students and talent.

Turkey now tops the list of the most popular destinations for students from the Middle East and North Africa and is increasingly enrolling students from Asia.

There is also the steady growth of regional alliances, such as the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and the African Union, which are harmonising national education systems and easing cross-border movement with significant results.

As Simon Marginson has observed, countries and universities in the Global South and East see an opportunity to “move into shared global leadership” in research and training.

Following Brexit, the United Kingdom occupies a “grey zone” still linked to Europe and the American scientific and academic communities through its network of Anglophone Commonwealth nations but also pursuing isolationist policies related to international students.

Israel is in a similar grey zone in the wake of the war in Gaza and with Iran and Lebanon.

While a relatively small nation in population, it is a significant producer of science and technological innovation but is becoming increasingly isolated, particularly from Europe and much of the Middle East. It largely retains its links with the US scientific community, for now.

Winners and losers

A third observation about the evolving neo-academic Cold War is that there are clear winners and losers.

With its many national members, the EU’s response to America’s protectionist agenda – including the dismantling of transnational agreements and erosion of the rules-based international order – is to invest in its universities and further build its scientific, technological and military capacity.

The EU is also expanding its international research collaborations, particularly with nations in South America, Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia. America’s decline as a destination for global talent and as a collaborator in scientific research works to the advantage of Europe’s science and academic ambitions.

The arbitrary deportation of students and academics, declining visa acceptances and a pervasive sense of fear provoked by social media vetting for ‘un-American’ content have made American universities significantly less attractive to talented international students and faculty.

The Trump administration has imposed new restrictions on H-1B visas that allow foreign faculty and researchers to be employed at universities, including raising the cost of applications from US$5,000 to US$100,000, making them financially prohibitive. A lawsuit is pending to prevent the implementation of this increase.

As of January 2026, approximately 8,000 US student visas were revoked in 2025. Preliminary estimates are for at least a 17% decline in new international student enrolment in the 2025 to 2026 academic year.

In the feeder markets of China, South Korea, India and African nations such as Nigeria, surveys show declining interest in attending an American college or university.

International talent mobility is shifting significantly away from the US as other parts of the world offer less costly and more welcoming and politically safer quality alternatives. And concern over high US crime rates is also a factor for international students.

A few months after Trump’s second inauguration, in the wake of federal cuts for academic research, universities in 12 European capitals launched programmes aimed at poaching scientists and promising faculty and students from American universities.

The European Commission also announced a €500 million (US$584 million) package to make Europe “a magnet for researchers” and targeted US-based scholars. Similar programmes to attract talent from the US have been announced by Australia, Canada and Japan.

Trump’s exploits are accelerating a longer trend of deferring to Europe to lead “Big Science” international projects and collaborative agreements, including the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN), new projects in thermonuclear energy, a US$3 billion lab to explore subatomic particles, and sponsorship of the All-Atlantic Ocean Research and Innovation Alliance.

“Inattention to the nuts and bolts of science and technology diplomacy has undermined the ability of the United States to be a destination country for major physics projects,” stated Cole Donovan from the Federation of American Scientists.

“Leadership in the field now comes from Europe and Asia, where smaller countries with smaller budgets have no choice but to work together to build major projects.”

While the US has decimated programmes and personnel that focus on transnational research cooperation in the State Department and other agencies, the EU is investing and promoting science diplomacy as “part of the EU’s priority of leveraging our power and partnership for a global Europe”.

The other and biggest winner is China. The erosion of American soft power capabilities, including dismissive attitudes toward science diplomacy and restrictions on foreign talent at universities and elsewhere in society, affords China greater opportunities to expand its geopolitical influence.

Xi’s government is increasing investments in universities and in specific scientific fields such as AI and quantum computing, while the policies of the Trump administration are intent on severely cutting scientific funding, generating fear within the academic community and eroding the nation’s attractiveness to the best talent.

Global challenges

Beyond the impact on individual nations, the rising tensions and silo effect of separate networks of scientific cooperation and research are having a dramatic negative impact on meeting global challenges that include climate change, ethical uses of AI, pandemic control and world health, food security, environmental stewardship and biodiversity loss.

Narrowing paths for science cooperation means seeking greater self-reliance but also a declining ability to deal with these complex issues, including the development of scientific expertise that relies on the interaction of scientists and scholars.

Silos of economic and research engagement may also result in an even more dysfunctional world with greater wealth disparities and political conflict, an inability to deal with the next pandemic and an even larger diaspora related to climate change, environmental degradation and political repression.

This includes a diaspora of academics fleeing autocratic regimes or repressive policies that are emerging even in once-stalwart defenders of academic freedom like the US.

A renaissance of democracies?

In early 2021, during the Biden administration and COVID-19, a White House report by the National Intelligence Council projected such a path unless America led a “renaissance of democracies” and managed “competitive coexistence” with nations like China.

In the near term, this renaissance is unlikely. As the neo-academic Cold War hardens, academic leaders and organisations are looking for ways to lessen its intensity.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the Royal Society in the UK issued a report, Science Diplomacy in an Era of Disruption, exhorting governments not to abandon science diplomacy as an essential tool of international relations, while worrying about the trajectory of geopolitical rivalries: “The open system of international scientific collaboration is being exploited to strengthen some national military capabilities, leading to heightened concerns about research security.”

Within the US and in other countries with neo-national and autocratic political leaders, universities and their academic communities are also seeking to find paths for retaining their autonomy and defending academic freedom at their institutions, as well as attempting to explain to their public the value of international engagement.

Others argue for higher education institutions, even under challenging political environments, to seek judicious forms of international engagement, including non-governmental and informal means for research collaboration – what is termed ‘Track 2 science diplomacy’ – reminiscent of the previous Cold War when opposing governments hindered the international interaction of academics. In some form, universities will undoubtedly play this traditional role.

However, the reality is that geopolitical competition and hostility, including responses to war, growing military threats and cybersecurity concerns, are reducing the avenues for international cooperation and academic engagement.

A future renewal?

This raises an important question: Can the remnants of decades of investments in a national and global infrastructure of transnational programmes, agreements and collaborative norms overcome these traumas? In other words, could this process of devolution have some meaningful end or limit, providing a pathway toward a future renewal?

Projecting the future of the neo-academic Cold War depends not only on America’s political evolution, or devolution, and the vitality of its academic community but also on the course chosen by other countries.

In the European Union, neo-nationalist political parties and their leaders have grown in popularity, including in the UK, France, Germany, Poland, Italy, the Netherlands and Sweden.

While it is conjecture, if autocratic-leaning politicians gain power in other parts of Europe – Reform UK, the National Front in France and the AFD in Germany – they may very well mimic Trump’s isolationist approach.

Because of the territorial ambitions of Russia and China and heightened sharp-power efforts to shape elections and degrade trust in more open societies, more funding for military and national security apparatus may also restrict funding for international academic engagement.

Pragmatic, if often erudite, arguments for the essential role of science diplomacy and transnational academic collaboration in an age of creeping neo-nationalism and transnational paranoia may well decline further as a global value.

Within the divisive geopolitical world, rebuilding a global science ecosystem that depends on the shared values of open science, as well as on mutual trust, long-term relationships, capacity building and formal agreements, will be a monumental international challenge.

John Aubrey Douglass is a research fellow at the Center for Studies in Higher Education, Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, United States. He is the lead author of Neo-Nationalism and Universities (Johns Hopkins University Press) and is currently completing work on the book Turning Points in American Higher Education: From the rise of the publics to the age of Trump (De Gruyter/Brill). This essay is adapted from an article submission currently under review.

This article was first published on the author’s Substack platform here.

This article is a commentary. Commentary articles are the opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of University World News.