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The diplomatic fissure between France and Australia caused by the new AUKUS alliance, together with a move to diversify within Asia from collaborations with China, has led to French foreign ministry funding for university collaborations being redirected from Australia to push new French collaborations in India.
At the same time, French universities looking to internationalize have been looking to Singapore and Southeast Asia to build research partnerships in addition to their existing partnerships with China, as a way of diversifying from ‘overdependence’ on China.
The AUKUS trilateral security pact between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States announced in September 2021 caused a diplomatic rift with France as it led to the cancellation of Australia’s acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines from France. The AUKUS pact has had far-reaching geopolitical implications as it was seen, in part, as a response to China’s emergence as a superpower in the Asia-Pacific region.
The relationship with Australia “went dark”, as French officials put it.
The AUKUS debacle has also had a knock-on effect on higher education as a just under €1 million (US$1 million) funding package allocated by Paris for research and student exchange alliances between French and Australian universities was earlier this year redirected to a new universities’ initiative with India known as the ‘Franco-Indian campus’.
“Universities do not deal with governments but with universities, but the overall geopolitical climate is having an impact,” said one French university representative just returned from India.
The thinking in Paris is that, with several long-established joint higher education projects with China, it is important to have “a strategy of attractiveness and visibility” for their universities for the whole Indo-Pacific region.
Initially this was envisaged as a two-pronged approach focused on Australia and India, but now Australia “is no longer in the picture”, according to officials, though suggesting Australia might return to the fold sometime in the future.
At the same time, French universities looking to internationalize have been looking to Singapore and Southeast Asia to build research partnerships in addition to their existing partnerships with China, as a way of diversifying from ‘overdependence’ on China.
The AUKUS trilateral security pact between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States announced in September 2021 caused a diplomatic rift with France as it led to the cancellation of Australia’s acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines from France. The AUKUS pact has had far-reaching geopolitical implications as it was seen, in part, as a response to China’s emergence as a superpower in the Asia-Pacific region.
The relationship with Australia “went dark”, as French officials put it.
The AUKUS debacle has also had a knock-on effect on higher education as a just under €1 million (US$1 million) funding package allocated by Paris for research and student exchange alliances between French and Australian universities was earlier this year redirected to a new universities’ initiative with India known as the ‘Franco-Indian campus’.
“Universities do not deal with governments but with universities, but the overall geopolitical climate is having an impact,” said one French university representative just returned from India.
The thinking in Paris is that, with several long-established joint higher education projects with China, it is important to have “a strategy of attractiveness and visibility” for their universities for the whole Indo-Pacific region.
Initially this was envisaged as a two-pronged approach focused on Australia and India, but now Australia “is no longer in the picture”, according to officials, though suggesting Australia might return to the fold sometime in the future.
French universities visit India
Representatives of about 22 French universities were in India at the end of June as contenders for the new project launched by France’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs jointly with the Ministry of Higher Education and Research in Paris to establish what is being called a ‘Franco-Indian campus’for health with the redirected funds from the cancelled Franco-Australian initiative.
The campus would not necessarily be a physical center at first but a joint venture around double degrees, joint degrees centered on health that can be expanded from a joint venture to some kind of institute as a component of an Indian university, officials said.
The French group met with around 40 Indian universities including seven Indian Institutes of Technology, four Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research as well as institutes of national importance, private institutions and centrally funded universities to seek to partner on projects under the French-funded scheme.
While university delegations from several countries have visited India in recent weeks, particularly from the United Kingdom, Germany and Australia, some institutions said that, in the case of France, it was an unprecedentedly large group of Indian institutions to meet with foreign universities.
With the French-funded project concentrating on health during the post-pandemic era, a number of medical universities and institutions specializing in health research and major science institutions were included, such as the Indian Institute of Science, Vellore Institute of Technology, Christian Medical College Vellore, National Center for Biological Sciences Bangalore, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology and Indian Institute of Chemical Technology.
Looking to partner with them were French universities such as Poitiers, Sorbonne in Paris, Paris-Scaly, Bordeaux, Clermont Auvergne, Côte d’Azur, Grenoble Alpes, Toulouse III Paul Sabatier, several universities from Lyon and École Normale Supérieure – PSL in Paris, among others.
They came together in what one French university representative described as a “speed-dating exercise” with Indian institutions in order to find common areas for partnership.
French officials said: “We want to put France on the map for Indian universities because, mostly, they are Anglo-US oriented.”
They noted that the Franco-Indian Campus project comes “at the right time”, as India is opening up to double degree joint degrees with new streamlined regulations announced in April under which the universities will no longer require University Grants Commission (UGC) authorization to go ahead with such degrees with foreign universities.
The campus would not necessarily be a physical center at first but a joint venture around double degrees, joint degrees centered on health that can be expanded from a joint venture to some kind of institute as a component of an Indian university, officials said.
The French group met with around 40 Indian universities including seven Indian Institutes of Technology, four Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research as well as institutes of national importance, private institutions and centrally funded universities to seek to partner on projects under the French-funded scheme.
While university delegations from several countries have visited India in recent weeks, particularly from the United Kingdom, Germany and Australia, some institutions said that, in the case of France, it was an unprecedentedly large group of Indian institutions to meet with foreign universities.
With the French-funded project concentrating on health during the post-pandemic era, a number of medical universities and institutions specializing in health research and major science institutions were included, such as the Indian Institute of Science, Vellore Institute of Technology, Christian Medical College Vellore, National Center for Biological Sciences Bangalore, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology and Indian Institute of Chemical Technology.
Looking to partner with them were French universities such as Poitiers, Sorbonne in Paris, Paris-Scaly, Bordeaux, Clermont Auvergne, Côte d’Azur, Grenoble Alpes, Toulouse III Paul Sabatier, several universities from Lyon and École Normale Supérieure – PSL in Paris, among others.
They came together in what one French university representative described as a “speed-dating exercise” with Indian institutions in order to find common areas for partnership.
French officials said: “We want to put France on the map for Indian universities because, mostly, they are Anglo-US oriented.”
They noted that the Franco-Indian Campus project comes “at the right time”, as India is opening up to double degree joint degrees with new streamlined regulations announced in April under which the universities will no longer require University Grants Commission (UGC) authorization to go ahead with such degrees with foreign universities.
Build on exchanges and mobility
Initially, the aim for some French universities is to step up student exchanges and faculty mobility “then over time, build actual joint degree programmer, mostly at the masters and doctoral level in the health sector and to provide different types of scientific collaboration,” said Christopher Cripps, the senior adviser for global engagement and diplomatic affairs at the president’s office of Sorbonne University in Paris, who was part of the French delegation.
The pre-selected group of French universities will bid for joint projects with Indian partners under the scheme, though not all may emerge successful.
“We were invited to India to meet with potential partners, to then submit by 30 September a final project proposal that will be evaluated by a jury sometime around October-November, so it is not finalized yet,” Cripps told University World News.
Whether or not they are part of the Franco-Indian Campus for health, French universities say they want to use the opportunity as a springboard for more ambitious plans with Indian universities.
“We don’t want this project, if we do it, to be short-term,” Cripps said. “We want the partnership to grow into more than just healthcare. We also need to be looking at other sciences and the humanities and a lot of the current ‘trendy’ but cutting-edge fields and multidisciplinary activities which is what we have going on at Sorbonne in artificial intelligence.”
He also pointed to a focus on Sustainable Development Goals. “Many universities are extremely focused on international development,” Cripps noted, adding that, for Sorbonne, “it is one of our main axes of strategic development. We also feel that, at the present time, the planet needs to be focused on One Health, One Earth and One Humanity.”
He acknowledged that, with the pandemic situation in China and geopolitical developments, “many people in higher education are looking at alternatives but, frankly, I don’t consider India as an alternative because things aren’t going so well with China, but because I think we need to flat out develop more with India, whatever’s going on with China. We haven’t developed enough with India.”
Sorbonne already has a strong partnership with China’s Renmin University, Beijing, with a joint venture, Sino-French Institute, which was established in 2010 in Suzhou, as well as a partnership with the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Elsewhere in Asia, Sorbonne has a strong partnership with Singapore’s Nanyang University of Technology, which includes joint doctoral degrees and joint training in materials science and nanotechnologies.
The pre-selected group of French universities will bid for joint projects with Indian partners under the scheme, though not all may emerge successful.
“We were invited to India to meet with potential partners, to then submit by 30 September a final project proposal that will be evaluated by a jury sometime around October-November, so it is not finalized yet,” Cripps told University World News.
Whether or not they are part of the Franco-Indian Campus for health, French universities say they want to use the opportunity as a springboard for more ambitious plans with Indian universities.
“We don’t want this project, if we do it, to be short-term,” Cripps said. “We want the partnership to grow into more than just healthcare. We also need to be looking at other sciences and the humanities and a lot of the current ‘trendy’ but cutting-edge fields and multidisciplinary activities which is what we have going on at Sorbonne in artificial intelligence.”
He also pointed to a focus on Sustainable Development Goals. “Many universities are extremely focused on international development,” Cripps noted, adding that, for Sorbonne, “it is one of our main axes of strategic development. We also feel that, at the present time, the planet needs to be focused on One Health, One Earth and One Humanity.”
He acknowledged that, with the pandemic situation in China and geopolitical developments, “many people in higher education are looking at alternatives but, frankly, I don’t consider India as an alternative because things aren’t going so well with China, but because I think we need to flat out develop more with India, whatever’s going on with China. We haven’t developed enough with India.”
Sorbonne already has a strong partnership with China’s Renmin University, Beijing, with a joint venture, Sino-French Institute, which was established in 2010 in Suzhou, as well as a partnership with the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Elsewhere in Asia, Sorbonne has a strong partnership with Singapore’s Nanyang University of Technology, which includes joint doctoral degrees and joint training in materials science and nanotechnologies.
Internationalizing universities look to Asia
Other French universities are also looking east to internationalise. Separately from the French-government backed partnership project in India, individual French universities are looking to expand in Asia.
In early July, the presidents of Sciences Po, Paris and Paris Cite universities individually visited Singapore to set up collaborations.
Mathias Vicherat, president of Paris Institute of Political Studies, commonly known as Sciences Po, which specializes in social sciences, told University World News: “The reason why we want be more present in the [Asian] region has to do with the fact that I want to enlarge the international impact of Sciences Po, not only with the Western world, but with all the regions in the world.
“We have something like 10 partnerships with Chinese universities, but we want to enlarge the scope of partnerships in Asia,” he noted, stressing that it was not just for geopolitical reasons but to diversify the student body, and not be dependent on any particular country for incoming students, looking not just to Singapore, but also Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia and India.
“For instance, 50% of our students are international and I want to reinforce in the student community at Sciences Po the presence of Asian students,” Vicherat said. “We also have 28 programmer of exchange – 13 in India and 15 in the [South East Asia] region and that has to do with the strategy to reinforce the links between Sciences Po and the region – and Singapore is the right hub for that.”
His aim is to double the number of students participating in exchanges with Singapore from 21 in the past year to around 28 in 2022-23 and to reinforce the dual and double degree programmer it has with National University of Singapore (NUS) and also reinforce research and teaching around global challenges such as the environmental transition and what he called the “digital transition”.
Vicherat pointed to NUS’s interdisciplinary approach between hard sciences and humanities. “This is something really important for us to develop when it comes to environmental transition,” he said noting that Sciences Po has already established some new dual degrees that cross the social science-science divide.
He is also keen to step up what is mainly a student exchange programmer with India to include research collaboration and plans a visit to India in the coming months to identify fields of cooperation with Indian universities.
In early July, the presidents of Sciences Po, Paris and Paris Cite universities individually visited Singapore to set up collaborations.
Mathias Vicherat, president of Paris Institute of Political Studies, commonly known as Sciences Po, which specializes in social sciences, told University World News: “The reason why we want be more present in the [Asian] region has to do with the fact that I want to enlarge the international impact of Sciences Po, not only with the Western world, but with all the regions in the world.
“We have something like 10 partnerships with Chinese universities, but we want to enlarge the scope of partnerships in Asia,” he noted, stressing that it was not just for geopolitical reasons but to diversify the student body, and not be dependent on any particular country for incoming students, looking not just to Singapore, but also Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia and India.
“For instance, 50% of our students are international and I want to reinforce in the student community at Sciences Po the presence of Asian students,” Vicherat said. “We also have 28 programmer of exchange – 13 in India and 15 in the [South East Asia] region and that has to do with the strategy to reinforce the links between Sciences Po and the region – and Singapore is the right hub for that.”
His aim is to double the number of students participating in exchanges with Singapore from 21 in the past year to around 28 in 2022-23 and to reinforce the dual and double degree programmer it has with National University of Singapore (NUS) and also reinforce research and teaching around global challenges such as the environmental transition and what he called the “digital transition”.
Vicherat pointed to NUS’s interdisciplinary approach between hard sciences and humanities. “This is something really important for us to develop when it comes to environmental transition,” he said noting that Sciences Po has already established some new dual degrees that cross the social science-science divide.
He is also keen to step up what is mainly a student exchange programmer with India to include research collaboration and plans a visit to India in the coming months to identify fields of cooperation with Indian universities.
Internationalization is key
Christine Clerici is president of University Paris Cite – a recent merger under a new name of three French universities – Paris Descartes (Paris V) and Paris Diderot (Paris VII) together with Paris Institute of Earth Physics, or IPGP.
Ten years ago France launched its own excellence initiative, selecting nine universities for its world-class programmer, including Paris Cite, and internationalization is a key component of its world-class drive.
While European partnerships are already important, Clerici told University World News: “We have to maintain our collaboration with ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) because it’s politically a strategic region. We have to consider that the presence of France in this region is important, independently of the political aspects.”
Paris Cite has a department of Asian studies with various language and cultural partnerships with Asian countries but, she said, she is looking to collaborate with Singapore in medicine and health.
Before the restructuring of the Paris university in 2019, Paris Descartes University established exchanges and research collaboration with Singapore mainly in the field of medicine. Clerici is keen to cross disciplinary boundaries with new partnerships around global challenges for instance, pointing to NUS’s interdisciplinary approach as key, having signed an agreement with the NUS graduate school during her visit.
“We are focusing now on some important challenges – artificial intelligence, global health, climate, environment,” she said adding that she hoped Paris Cite and NUS and other universities in Asia can share research. “We will choose the best universities (in Asia) that we think are close to us in terms of disciplines and rankings,” she said.
While Paris Cite already has strong partnerships with Vietnam through the University of Science and Technology in Hanoi with doctoral student and professorial exchanges, she said that, longer term, she was keen to develop a relationship with Taiwan and also Indonesia.
Source: University World News
Ten years ago France launched its own excellence initiative, selecting nine universities for its world-class programmer, including Paris Cite, and internationalization is a key component of its world-class drive.
While European partnerships are already important, Clerici told University World News: “We have to maintain our collaboration with ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) because it’s politically a strategic region. We have to consider that the presence of France in this region is important, independently of the political aspects.”
Paris Cite has a department of Asian studies with various language and cultural partnerships with Asian countries but, she said, she is looking to collaborate with Singapore in medicine and health.
Before the restructuring of the Paris university in 2019, Paris Descartes University established exchanges and research collaboration with Singapore mainly in the field of medicine. Clerici is keen to cross disciplinary boundaries with new partnerships around global challenges for instance, pointing to NUS’s interdisciplinary approach as key, having signed an agreement with the NUS graduate school during her visit.
“We are focusing now on some important challenges – artificial intelligence, global health, climate, environment,” she said adding that she hoped Paris Cite and NUS and other universities in Asia can share research. “We will choose the best universities (in Asia) that we think are close to us in terms of disciplines and rankings,” she said.
While Paris Cite already has strong partnerships with Vietnam through the University of Science and Technology in Hanoi with doctoral student and professorial exchanges, she said that, longer term, she was keen to develop a relationship with Taiwan and also Indonesia.
Source: University World News