Reform of French Science Support Looks to be Running on Low Octane. (March 12, 2006)

    There were 42,000 signatories to the petition SAUVONS LA RECHERCHE! (Let's Save Research) presented to the French government on January 7^th 2004.

 The main points of the petition are:

1. At the dawn of the 21st century, France needs dynamic research.

2. To hold that it is possible to limit research to a few priority areas is to start down a road towards underdevelopment.

3. In France, fundamental research is currently being abandoned by the State.

4. Despite official statements claiming that research is a national priority, the French government is in the process of shutting down the public research sector without considering that there is nothing to replace it.

5. The central guidelines of scientific policy should be publicly controlled. But the government cannot at the same time disengage the State and guide research with methods that may paralyse it.

6. There is no example of scientific research that is exclusively orchestrated and controlled by a Ministry. It is a scientific and bureaucratic illusion to believe in such a scenario...

7. The petitioners consider it their responsibility to act collectively against the planned destruction of France's research capacity.

The full petition is available in French and English.

Then at the end of March 2004 following a stinging repudiation of candidates of French President Jacques Chirac's conservative party in regional midterm elections, a cabinet reshuffle saw François Fillon, installed as minister for education, higher education and research, while  François d'Aubert, became junior minister for research. The next day Chirac publicly disowned the research policies of his previous government and declared the scientists' protests "justified".

But by July 2005 despite work on proposed reforms being more than a year in formation the proposals put forward by Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) director Bernard Larrouturou gave the appearance of being forged hastily and matters had been further complicated by the rejection by the French voters of the proposed European Union Constitution. For example junior research minister François d'Aubert was ousted as part of the new government formed by Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin, and François Goulard, who served as junior transport and sea minister in the last government, assumed France's top science policy position and took responsibility for higher education as well.

Now the actual proposal of the research reform law, due to be voted on by the full National Assembly on March 7, has won few plaudits from those to be directly affected. Demonstrations were held in Paris, Lyon and Toulouse on February 28 but the number of demonstrators (estimated between 700 to 2,000) were a far cry from the 42,000 who signed the original partition or the subsequent massive Parisian protest march. The predicted apathy hoped for by the government appears to have been realised.

ResearchReseach reports "the law put to parliament does not take account of proposals put forward in October 2004 by the Etats Généraux de la Recherche, an independent committee set up to consult with French researchers. Sauvons la Recherche says that despite protracted discussions and delays to the law, it is now being rushed through Parliament without adequate discussions on points of concern to the scientific community.
    "The group’s main fears are that the reform will not improve pay and conditions for young researchers, will stifle researchers’ creativity and will focus upon supporting private research rather than public research in universities and research institutions.
    "'The government knows very well that its bill is very far removed from the constructive propositions made over a year ago by the scientific community.'"

The package includes a number of measures proposed to attract young researchers  into labs and making innovation the engine of a flagging economy, but with the exception education and science minister Gilles de Robien and minister delegate François Goulard, who shepherded the bill to a vote show much enthusiasm.

According to Science the measures introduced will expand "The research budget... from €19.9 billion in 2005 to €24 billion in 2010. Along with providing more money, the new law attempts to simplify research management and empowers a new National Research Agency (ANR) to dole out funds for projects based on merit reviews, a novelty in France. But the scientific community had hoped for a bigger financial boost. 'I have very mixed feelings,' says physicist Edouard Brézin, president of the Academy of Sciences, who says the bill bespeaks a 'lack of ambition.'

    "Studies have concluded that [French science] is lagging behind the rest of Europe and the United States, based upon the declining quantity and quality of research outputs as well as the small number of new patents and biotech start-ups that stem from French research. Low wages and scarce lab resources have made the profession unattractive for young people. And the prime advantage of joining the vast scientific civil service--security for life--hardly stimulates creativity.

    "Government labs such as the mammoth CNRS and INSERM, where most research takes place, are at arm's length from higher education, and university scientists are overburdened with teaching tasks, the academy report concluded. Bureaucratic rules waste precious time and money, too, says Bernard Meunier, who quit as CNRS president in January to protest 'excessive' bureaucracy."

SAUVONS LA RECHERCHE co-founder and spokesperson Alain Trautmann concedes, "The hemorrhage has stopped; that's positive." but critics claim the bill falls far short of what's needed to revamp resourced starved government labs, and point out that some one-third of the new money will be in the form of tax deductions for industry, not exactly a boon for fundamental research.

If matters proceed according to governmental plans the proposals will be approved by both legislative houses on March 16.