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8.4.4Relative intensity of collaboration (RIC)

While these trends in international collaboration are informative, they do not tell the whole story. The absolute collaboration numbers are highly dependent on the relative size of the research output of each of the countries involved. Throughout the past twenty years, there has been a global increase in publication output across the globe, as well as an increase in publications indexed in the Web of Science (which is the indexing service we use for this analysis). In short, we need to study the relative intensity of collaboration to understand the evolution of research collaboration between Flanders and key international partners.

The Relative Intensity of Collaboration (RIC) is an asymmetric affinity index introduced by Fuchs, Sivertsen and Rousseau (Fuchs et al., 2021) as “the ratio of the share of the collaborations of A and B within all collaborations of A to the share of collaborations of B within all collaborations of the system excluding collaborations of A”. The formula looks as follows:

The RIC between Flanders and the US is thus calculated as the ratio of the share of Flanders-US collaborations within all Flemish international collaborations to the share of US international collaborations within all global international collaborations except for Flemish international collaborations. The interesting properties of this index are the following: the RIC(Flanders, US) will increase if collaboration between Flanders and the US increases, all other values remaining constant. The RIC(Flanders, US) will decrease if the collaborations with all other countries increase, while collaboration between Flanders and the US remains constant.

A distinction between bilateral and multilateral RIC was proposed by Engels et al. (2025), who point out that geopolitical events may have a different effect on small-scale bilateral collaborations and larger-scale multilateral collaborations.  Figure 3 gives a general overview of the relative collaboration trends between Flanders and key partners.

The relative intensity of bilateral and multilateral collaboration between Flanders and its neighbours has been increasing in the 21st century. In particular, the relative intensity of Flemish collaboration with the Netherlands, which was already at a high level in the year 2000, has increased the most, indicating strong ties between the Flemish and Dutch research systems. The Flemish and Dutch governments have signed two joint declarations of intent towards bilateral cooperation in the areas of science, innovation and the economy (Departement WEWIS, n.d.). A recent example of collaboration is the joint candidacy of Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany to host the Einstein Telescope (Einstein Telescope EMR., n.d.). In terms of bilateral collaboration, the bilateral collaboration ties with Germany and France have remained more or less steady, while the multilateral collaboration ties have increased slightly.

Figure 3a. Flemish RIC with France, Germany and the Netherlands.

Bilateral

FranceGermanyNetherlands0,000,501,001,502,002,503,003,504,004,505,00RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,501,001,502,002,503,003,504,004,505,002000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 FranceGermanyNetherlands012345RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0123452000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 FranceGermanyNetherlands012345RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0123452000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024

Figure 3b. Flemish RIC with France, Germany and the Netherlands.

Multilateral

FranceGermanyNetherlands0,000,501,001,502,002,503,003,50RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,501,001,502,002,503,003,502000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 FranceGermanyNetherlands0,000,501,001,502,002,503,003,50RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,501,001,502,002,503,003,502000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 FranceGermanyNetherlands0123RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year01232000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024

The relative intensity of bilateral and multilateral collaboration with the UK, US and China display a different pattern, however. While the relative intensity of multilateral collaboration between Flanders and the US displays a slowly increasing trend over the last two decades, the relative intensity of bilateral collaboration between Flanders and China has surpassed the relative intensity of bilateral collaboration between Flanders and the US in recent years. The RIC between Flanders and the UK has been consistently strong. However, since the UK left the European Union in 2020, there has been some insecurity about the UK’s future in the Horizon Europe programme. As of yet, this has not resulted in a drop in the relative intensity of multilateral collaboration. A slight drop in bilateral collaboration can be observed in the past few years.

Figure 4a. Belgian's RIC with the China, UK and US

Bilateral

Peoples R ChinaUKUSA0,000,100,200,300,400,500,600,700,80RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,100,200,300,400,500,600,700,802000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 Peoples R ChinaUKUSA0,000,100,200,300,400,500,600,700,80RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,100,200,300,400,500,600,700,802000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 Peoples R ChinaUKUSA0,000,200,400,600,80RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,200,400,600,802000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024

Figure 4b. Belgian's RIC with the China, UK and US

Multilateral

Peoples R ChinaUKUSA0,000,200,400,600,801,001,201,401,60RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,200,400,600,801,001,201,401,602000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 Peoples R ChinaUKUSA0,000,200,400,600,801,001,201,401,60RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,200,400,600,801,001,201,401,602000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024 Peoples R ChinaUKUSA0,000,501,001,50RIC2000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024Publication year0,000,501,001,502000200120022003200420052006200720082009201020112012201320142015201620172018201920202021202220232024

Overall, Flemish multilateral collaboration with neighbouring countries and with the UK is clearly more intensive than with the US or China, the latter still at a relatively low level. Bilateral collaboration, however, is intense with the Netherlands, but less so with France, Germany, UK, US and China. In most recent years we notice a rapid increase in bilateral collaboration with China, which may be fuelled by the continuing growth of research output involving Chinese institutions. China’s research output showed great increase in the years 2021 and 2022 and continued to increase after a slight dip in 2023. Most other countries, however, experienced more serious declines in the years 2022 and 2023 and have not yet recovered to 2021 levels (Rousseau et al., 2025).