French National Assembly Passes Bill Granting Increased Autonomy to the Nation's 85 Universities. (July 27, 2007)

    A fortnight ago TFW reported:

Prior to his election to the French Presidency on May 6, Nicholas Sarkozy told an audience: "In the race against Stanford, Cambridge or Harvard, French universities run with their laces tied together and a backpack full of stones," and gave the French public that he intended to change that.

 

In his first step to attempt what many suggest will be the equivalent of a Labour of Hercules M Sarkozy on July 4 had his cabinet adopt a bill that would make France's 85 public universities much more independent, largely freeing them from the current centralized state control.

 

The French president also restated his intention to award the universities an extra €5 billion (A$8 billion) over the next five years; that, and on most accounts considerably more, will be needed to get the sector's shoelaces untied and the stone removed from the their backpacks.

 

If the promise becomes near fulfillment, French universities may in time come to suffer significantly less interference from their political masters than Australia's Coalition government is foisting on our tertiary sector.

 

 And broader university reform are in the offing, says prime minister François Fillon, who has described the future of French universities as the most important item on his domestic agenda.^{1, 2}

Yesterday Le Monde reported that the French National Assembly voted to grant increased autonomy to the nation's universities within the next five years. It will give the institutions greater control in obtaining and demarking their funds as well as having more discretion over hiring and the awarding of salaries.

According to Le Monde: The main student group, which had threatened large-scale protests in fact has reacted favourably to praising some of the amendments that had been added prior to passage of the bill. For example, the National Assembly rejected a measure, added in the Senate, that would have allowed individuals outside French academe to participate in the election of university presidents. Nevertheless the statement declared the students remained "extremely uneasy about the consequences of this law".

One the other hand The Conference of University Presidents expressed satisfaction with the bill’s passage: “[The bill will] allow all universities and higher-education institutions to acquire new powers for the benefit of students, research, and the development of our country.”

Prior to the measure becoming law at the beginning of August it will be examined by a commission of seven deputies and seven senators which is expected on August 1.