I have the following XML (simplified example) which should have a parent/child relationship between two ComboBox's. The parent binds correctly but the child does not bind to the parents SelectedItem.

When I set xmlns against the foobar XML and remove all namespace references it works as expected. Also if I set ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=fb:foo/fb:bars/fb:bar}" against comboBar it finds all the bar nodes as expected from both foo elements.

EXAMPLE (tested to work in XamlPad)

Code:
<Page xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
      xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml">

  <Page.Resources>
    <XmlDataProvider x:Key="foobarSource" XPath="fb:foobar">
      <XmlDataProvider.XmlNamespaceManager>
        <XmlNamespaceMappingCollection>
          <XmlNamespaceMapping
            Prefix="fb" Uri="http://foo.bar/1.0/foobar.xsd"/>
        </XmlNamespaceMappingCollection>
      </XmlDataProvider.XmlNamespaceManager>
      <x:XData>
        <foobar xmlns="http://foo.bar/1.0/foobar.xsd">
          <foo name="Foo 1">
            <bars name='bars 1'>
              <bar name="first"/>
              <bar name="second"/>
            </bars>
          </foo>
          <foo name="Foo 2">
            <bars name='bars 2'>
              <bar name="third"/>
              <bar name="fourth"/>
            </bars>
          </foo>
        </foobar>
      </x:XData>
    </XmlDataProvider>
    <DataTemplate x:Key="comboTemplate">
      <TextBlock Text="{Binding XPath=@name}" />
    </DataTemplate>
  </Page.Resources>

  <StackPanel DataContext="{StaticResource foobarSource}">
    <ComboBox Width="150" x:Name="comboFoo"
              IsSynchronizedWithCurrentItem="True"
              ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=fb:foo}"
              ItemTemplate="{StaticResource comboTemplate}"/>
    <ComboBox Width="150" x:Name="comboBar"
              IsSynchronizedWithCurrentItem="True"
              DataContext="{Binding SelectedItem, ElementName=comboFoo}"
              ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=fb:bars/fb:bar}"
              ItemTemplate="{StaticResource comboTemplate}"/>
  </StackPanel>
</Page>