French National Centre for Scientific Research


The French National Centre for Scientific Research is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe.
In 2016, it employed 31,637 staff, including 11,137 tenured researchers, 13,415 engineers and technical staff, and 7,085 contractual workers. It is headquartered in Paris and has administrative offices in Brussels, Beijing, Tokyo, Singapore, Washington, D.C., Bonn, Moscow, Tunis, Johannesburg, Santiago de Chile, Israel, and New Delhi.
The CNRS was ranked No. 3 in 2015 and No. 4 in 2017 by the Nature Index, which measures the largest contributors to papers published in 82 leading journals.

Organization

The CNRS operates on the basis of research units, which are of two kinds: "proper units" are operated solely by the CNRS, and "joint units" are run in association with other institutions, such as universities or INSERM. Members of joint research units may be either CNRS researchers or university employees. Each research unit has a numeric code attached and is typically headed by a university professor or a CNRS research director. A research unit may be subdivided into research groups. The CNRS also has support units, which may, for instance, supply administrative, computing, library, or engineering services.
In 2016, the CNRS had 952 joint research units, 32 proper research units, 135 service units, and 36 international units.
The CNRS is divided into 10 national institutes:
The National Committee for Scientific Research, which is in charge of the recruitment and evaluation of researchers, is divided into 47 sections. Research groups are affiliated with one primary institute and an optional secondary institute; the researchers themselves belong to one section. For administrative purposes, the CNRS is divided into 18 regional divisions.

Employment

Researchers who are permanent employees of the CNRS are classified in two categories, each subdivided into two or three classes, and each class is divided into several pay grades.
In principle, research directors tend to head research groups, but this is not a general rule.
Employees for support activities include research engineers, studies engineers, assistant engineers and technicians. Contrary to what the name would seem to imply, these can have administrative duties.
All permanent support employees are recruited through annual nationwide competitive campaigns. Following a 1983 reform, the candidates selected have the status of civil servants and are part of the public service.

History

The CNRS was created on 19 October 1939 by decree of President Albert Lebrun. Since 1954, the centre has annually awarded gold, silver, and bronze medals to French scientists and junior researchers. In 1966, the organisation underwent structural changes, which resulted in the creation of two specialised institutes: the National Astronomy and Geophysics Institute in 1967 and the Institut national de physique nucléaire et de physique des particules in 1971.

Controversies

The performance of the CNRS has been questioned, with calls for wide-ranging reforms. In particular, the effectiveness of the recruitment, compensation, career management, and evaluation procedures have been under scrutiny. Governmental projects include the transformation of the CNRS into an organization allocating support to research projects on an ad hoc basis and the reallocation of CNRS researchers to universities. Another controversial plan advanced by the government involves breaking up the CNRS into six separate institutes.

Leadership

Past presidents

was appointed president on 20 January 2010. His position combined the previous positions of president and director general.