‘We have seen a 30% increase in foreign applications’: French varsity Sciences Po Director

Of the 15,000 students at the university, which offers courses in the social sciences, including in economics, law, history, and political science, around 50% are international students, with students from the USA making up their largest international cohort. Of the international students, around 400 are Indian, Vassy said.

“For international students, we have 10 applications for one admission, so these are very selective programs. We don’t want to change that, but we are seeing more demand – this year we have seen a 30% increase in foreign applications compared to last year…maybe because of the context in the US, the UK, in Canada…international tectonics also plays a role,” Vassy said.

In a conversation, Vassy, who also studied at Sciences Po, spoke about the agenda of his India visit, how he hopes to deepen ties with Indian institutions, and the protests that the Sciences Po campus saw last year.

Q. Since this is your first international visit since taking charge as Director, what is on your agenda in India?
A. Sciences Po is a very internationalised institution – 50% of our students come from outside of France. Most of our programs are taught in French and in English. We have this traditional, strong openness towards the international arena in terms of cooperation. When we look towards expanding this cooperation, and looking at where our priorities should be, India comes as an obvious choice. The assessment is that we have here an intellectual and academic superpower. We have extremely talented students in very large numbers.

Usually, higher education cooperation is around engineering schools or business schools where relations are already very strong. We want to make sure that we can also increase (this) in topics like governance, finance, law, urban studies. We have a set of areas where we can certainly do more. I want to make sure that we take all opportunities to increase cooperation. I also do that in a context where France and India relations have been traditionally strong in all arenas. There is an objective that has been set by the two governments to get to 30,000 Indian students in France. And, we also hope that we have more French students coming to Indian universities.

Q. A few other countries have tightened visa rules for international students or imposed a cap on the number of international students. How do you read this situation? Is that contributing to an increase in applications in French universities?
A. We have not experienced visa issues for our Indian students.

People are looking at the debate on foreign students in Canada, in the US, in other countries. It is a very vivid debate. We are not subjected to that. There is a consensus in France around the internationalisation of Sciences Po. In very simple terms, it makes sense for us to train our elites in an international context. The school was a traditional school of the French elites…economic, political, administrative…it was very French 25 years ago, compared to the internationalisation now. That also corresponds to a need, which is to train elites that are open to understanding the rest of the world. By bringing foreign students, we also bring value to the training of our elites.

Q. Last year, Sciences Po announced a dual masters program with TISS in Mumbai, the first such program with an Indian university. Are other such programs in the offing?  
A. We are glad to have that program, and are certainly eager to have other programs with other universities. We already have 14 partners here in India, public and private universities, institutes of technology. I see eagerness in deepening these ties also on the side of my Indian counterparts. We will try to see how that can be developed.

There are several possibilities. I would like to see that we increase our partnerships in government affairs and public policy. I also think there is a lot of potential in the combination of engineering studies and social sciences. We know this country trains many engineers and maybe that’s something where we can build joint programs also, together with Indian institutions.

Q. The Indian government had announced that they would allow foreign universities to set up campuses in India. Is that something Sciences Po might consider?
A. It is a bit early for me to decide. Right now, my priority is to deepen ties with elite Indian institutions. But if there is a willingness on the Indian side, and if there is interest, possibilities are open. But right now, in the short term, priority should be to deepen ties with the best Indian institutions and see how we can increase our work together…deepen ties in terms of more mobility, more dual programs, maybe academics moving from one place to another, maybe more research also.

Q. The university was in the news last year for police intervention on campus during student protests against Israel’s attack on Gaza. What has been your stand on student protests?
A. We put freedom of expression at the very centre of our journey. It means freedom of expression for individuals and groups. No qualms there. It also means making sure that we never limit the freedom of expression of others, and there are ways sometimes of expressing oneself…when it becomes aggressive, when you take the whole space for yourself, when you protest in a way that is intimidating for others, you can also have a negative impact on freedom of expression of others. I am attached to the fact that all opinions can be expressed on campus as long as they are legal.

What we have been is reaffirming the principle of freedom of expression, but also recalling with lots of goodwill and when needed, with firmness, that there is a framework in which this freedom of expression works. It’s a very open framework, but no violence, no intimidation, and no taking control of campus by sheer force of numbers.

Because we are an intellectual and academic institution, we also want to tackle issues through these lenses. When it comes to the Israel-Palestine conflict, we did conferences within the university, to make sure that we enter into these complicated issues through knowledge and academic approaches.

We will also determine our position on the tricky issue of whether an institution should position itself on political issues. I received a report a few days ago from three academics at Sciences Po on this question of where should the standard be when it comes to taking political positions as an institution. As I said, individuals and groups can express their opinions freely, but should institutions take positions? That’s an open debate. I gave my opinion in that regard which is more towards the reserved side. I feel that if you position yourself politically, you will become a political object and hence will be attacked politically. But I want that to be something that we tackle through consensus within the institution. So, we will debate that issue in February at the university’s governance council.

Q. From your time as a student at the university, how have you seen it change over the years?
A. There is continuity and there is lots of change. Continuity in this very specific mixture of theory and practice. Lots of courses are from professionals who are active in their fields. There, we benefit from being in the centre of Paris. It’s also this combination of training for the civil service and the private sector.

What has changed is the internationalisation – it used to be very much a French school for training the French elites. It has become a global school training elites from all over. That’s an incredibly positive transformation. You cannot understand what you need to do for your country if you don’t have some international exposure.

We bring people from all over the world together to understand what responsible leadership is and the values that they can take back to their countries. Also, a place where we understand – and this is also why I want to increase relations with India – that a democratic system can and needs to be an efficient system. We need to know that in the medium and long term, democracies are more efficient because they are more open and creative and bring more growth, but I’d like for us to be a place where we see how democracies are also efficient in the short run when faced with autocratic competitors.

The very history of the school…it was founded after the defeat of France in 1871 with the programme of forming elites for a French republic that would be as efficient as their autocratic competitors. And in a sense, that has been a success in the last 150 years. We want to continue building that link between leadership, democracy, efficiency that is key for our societies.