What is Emmanuel Macron’s real ambition on research? “Faced with threats, […] Europe must become a refuge ”, Launched the President of the Republic in the Sorbonne amphitheater faces an impressive areopage this Monday, May 5. The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, was present with fifteen French and European ministers to attend the launch of the Choose Europe for Science (choose Europe for science), as are around twenty presidents of French universities and fifteen of their European counterparts. With a clear ambition: attract scientists affected by the Trump administration policy. It is indeed to the American president that Emmanuel Macron refers when, at the gallery, he denounces the “Diktat which would consist in saying that a government” can prohibit “To look for this or that”.
Since his accession to power, Donald Trump has been in “Obscurantism”, According to the word of Robert Neel Proctor, historian of science at Stanford University, known for his work on the tobacco industry and present at the Sorbonne. The US government has turned scientists, cutting budgets but also prohibits the use of certain words (genre, climate, diversity, etc.) in research projects.
To accommodate these researchers in danger, the French government unlocks 100 million euros, as Emmanuel Macron announces it from the Sorbonne. In the wake of Aix-Marseille University, several universities and research organizations publish actions for researchers prevented in the United States. With a downside: to obtain state support, projects will have to focus on one of the government’s priority themes. Gender studies, decolonialism or minorities, although very attacked in the United States, are excluded.
As a reminder, the annual budget for research and higher education amounts to more than 30 billion euros. What to put this effort of 100 million euros taken on the envelope of the 54 billion euros of the large investment plan France 2030. In addition, the Elysian system asking universities, for many in deficit, to finance half of this effort of solidarity, the Mathematician Claire Mathieu “Fear that its real impact will be marginal”.
Despite the emphasis of Ursula von der Leyen – “Science is the key to our future here in Europe” –the European Union is barely better. 500 million euros over three years (2025, 2026, 2027) are released. An amount to be compared to 95.5 billion euros in the Union Research and Innovation Program from 2021 to 2027. “You have to grasp the magnitude of the current disaster in the United States, Comments Claire Mathieu, on the sidelines of a press conference of the Stand Up for Science network, held in the wake of the presidential raout, at the Academy of the Climate in Paris. If Trump goes to the end of his idea, he could remove $ 46 billion in the American science budget in 2026. ”
-Also, if Emmanuel Macron and Ursula von der Leyen really want to take the world scientific leadership that the United States is abandoning, the financial effort to be provided will be much more important. The President of the Commission sets the Union the objective of arriving at “3 % of GDP for investment in research and development by 2030”. This was already the objective for 2020 and it does not exceed 2.2 %… For the moment this initiative chooses Europe for science therefore marks a welcome solidarity with an attacked community, but without necessarily the means of its ambitions.
The most positive consequence may therefore not be financial. Indeed, Ursula von der Leyen also affirmed her will to“Entering the freedom of scientific research in law by means of a new legislative act on the European research area”. Academic freedom is what allows researchers to guide their work – and their courses – as they wish, regardless of political pressures. In France, the Senators Pierre Ouzoulias (PCF) and Louis Vogel (Horizons) have tabled a bill aimed at ensuring in the Constitution this principle currently existing in the education code.
An act far from being anecdotal. In 2020, in full debate on the supposed «Islamogauchisme» At university, the senatorial right had passed an amendment asking that “Academic freedoms are exercised in respect of the values of the Republic”. The proposal had been postponed by the Assembly, but the attempted submission of researchers to the politician was there. And she didn’t come from the far right.
Updated At 6.30 p.m. with the full release of Liberation.
