A few days before the first round of the presidential election, the theme of scientific research has not been a much debated subject, although the recent period could have been the occasion, with an ongoing pandemic and questions about energy resources linked to the war in Ukraine or global warming.
Nevertheless, the proposals on the subject are not lacking, with, in some cases, a new coloring linked to current events. Indeed, to justify significant expenditure (18.2 billion euros for the public) on activities employing a large number of civil servants (approximately 116,000), it is traditional for speeches to make the link between research activity and economic growth, for example by referring to innovation or upskilling.
But this year, war and pandemic news oblige, several programs prefer to the word “growth” those of “independence” or “sovereignty”, as with Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, Marine Le Pen, Emmanuel Macron, Valérie Pécresse or Eric Zemmour.
A consensus is emerging to resume the objective proclaimed for more than twenty years to spend 3% of GDP on public and private research
Other candidates also take the times into account, linking research to the necessary transition (Yannick Jadot, Fabien Roussel, Anne Hidalgo) or « bifurcation » ecological (Jean-Luc Mélenchon). On the other hand, as five years ago, the two far left candidates, Nathalie Arthaud and Philippe Poutou, are distinguished by more universalist and less economic discourses, as they expressed in response to a questionnaire from the Academy of Sciences. “Science, scientific materialism, [sont] one of the conditions and the means of the emancipation of humanity.for the first. «The science vise (…) to construct knowledge that is useful for understanding the world.for the second.
A consensus is emerging to resume the objective proclaimed for more than twenty years to spend 3% of GDP on public and private research efforts (France is at 2.2%), accompanied by increases in salaries and positions. Jean-Luc Mélenchon distinguishes himself by assigning half of the effort to public research when his competitors speak of a third. Whatever the outcome of the vote, the world of research will have to prepare for new changes, such as it has regularly experienced since 2005.
The candidate president announced, even though a law qualified as historic was passed at the end of 2020 (law of research programming, LPR), that it would be necessary to go “faster and stronger” than the latter. Without giving figures, one of his “relays” on the subject, Louis Vogel, indicates that“there is an awareness to improve working conditions” in the laboratories and that its candidate wants “increase wages”, “renovate premises”, “simplify”… Such commitments are surprising because they had been unanimously demanded by the oppositions and the working groups during the drafting and discussion of the LPR, without being heard. ” It’s now or never “insists Louis Vogel, who invites “to trust”.
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