Survey on Public Research Funding

Following the Prime Minister’s announcement on February 1 of a multi-year research programming law, a coalition of 22 scholarly societies launched a two-stage consultation on the academic community’s key expectations regarding this law. Last March, the AFSP asked political scientists to participate in an initial survey, which garnered more than 3,000 responses. Their analysis confirms high expectations regarding the multi-year research programming law and has helped identify priority issues to be addressed in the law. Hence this second phase of consultation with the academic community via four additional thematic surveys that will be posted online between April 19 and May 10.

A summary of the results of the first online consultation can be downloaded here.

Based on the responses to this initial questionnaire, four additional thematic surveys will be posted online between April 19 and May 10:
1) Institutional funding of public research (this week)
2) Scientific employment (open the week of April 22–26)
3) Administrative organization of research (open the week of April 29–May 3)
4) Relations between public research and society (open the week of May 6–10).

Each survey will remain open for a period of two weeks; the first anonymized summaries of the responses to each questionnaire will be made public as soon as the survey closes and will be used to advocate for the community’s position before the ministerial working groups preparing the programming law and before members of Congress.

The survey on public research funding will be open from April 19 at 10:00 a.m. to May 2 at 12:00 p.m. via this link.

As a reminder, the timeline announced by the ministry is as follows: February 2019: Launch of the working groups July 2019: Presentation of the working groups’ findings August–December 2019: Drafting of the Multi-Year Research Planning Act Some time in 2020: Adoption and enactment of the Multi-Year Research Planning Act January 1, 2021: Entry into force

List of organizing societies: French Society for Developmental Biology, French Mathematical Society, French Society for Ecology and Evolution, French Society for Astronomy and Astrophysics, French Political Science Association, Society for Neuroscience, French Computer Science Society, French Mechanics Association, Society of University Professors of Ancient History, Society of Applied Mathematics, Society of Medieval Historians in Public Higher Education, French Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, French Society of Optics.