The Ile-de-France region is “suspending” its funding for Sciences Po, the scene of a tense pro-Gaza mobilization, “until serenity and security are restored”, President LR Valérie announced on Monday Pécresse.
“A minority of radicalized people calling for anti-Semitic hatred, and exploited by the LFI and its Islamo-leftist allies, cannot dictate their law to the entire educational community,” accuses the right-wing president on day of blockage and mobilization, punctuated by tensions, was held at Sciences Po Paris, in the presence of several LFI deputies.
A State-region plan contract
Regional support for the prestigious school includes one million euros “planned for 2024 as part of the CPER (State-region plan contract)”, Valérie Pécresse’s entourage told AFP. Other “operating credits”, intended in particular for international mobility, planned “for spring and the start of the school year” are suspended, added the same source. The provisional administrator of Sciences Po, Jean Bassères, says he “regrets” this announcement from Valérie Pécresse, in an interview with Le Monde published Tuesday. “The Ile-de-France region is an essential partner of Sciences Po, and I wish to maintain a dialogue on the position expressed by Ms. Pécresse,” he adds.
On X, the socialist, environmentalist and radical group in the regional council denounced a “double standard”. “When it comes to suspending subsidies to the Stanislas high school because the former (boarding school) director regularly consulted child pornography sites […]it’s radio silence on Valérie Pécresse’s side,” he criticized.
“It’s a shame and an absolute scandal”, for her part castigated the Insoumise Mathilde Panot after a meeting with Prime Minister Gabriel Attal. “The youth of Sciences Po, like the youth of the Sorbonne today, like the youth of Columbia and the thirty universities who are fighting to refuse the silent killing of Palestinians, is the honor of the world and the honor of our country”, said the leader of the LFI deputies.
Students “have the right to demonstrate not only to demand that disciplinary sanctions be removed against students who just had the audacity to say that they refused to live in a world in which the international community is completely powerless […] and to refuse that a genocide, the first filmed genocide in history, takes place without there being any reaction in our country and in the world,” she added.
An internal debate
In response to a mobilization of pro-Palestinian students echoing the protests agitating prestigious American campuses, the management of Sciences Po Paris committed Friday evening to organizing an internal debate and to suspend disciplinary procedures launched against demonstrators. This “suspension” of disciplinary procedures does not concern the investigation opened in March after an accusation of anti-Semitism, underlined Sunday the Minister of Higher Education Sylvie Retailleau.
On Monday, the police entered the Sorbonne to evacuate pro-Palestinian activists who had set up tents inside these university buildings. Prime Minister Gabriel Attal “asked that the Sorbonne be evacuated quickly”, as “he had asked for Sciences Po on Friday”, his entourage said.
The State “will not cut its subsidy”
For its part, the State “will not cut its subsidy” to Sciences Po Paris, declared Tuesday the Minister of Higher Education, Sylvie Retailleau. “We have a contract of objectives and means of performance currently under discussion, we have leverage to discuss with Sciences Po”, but “the State will not cut the subsidy to Sciences Po”, said the minister on France 2, estimating state funding for Sciences Po Paris at 75 million euros.