Shanghai ranking: France maintains its rank – Les Échos

Despite a lackluster performance in some of its favorite disciplines, France maintained its rank at the recently closed Tokyo Olympics. French universities, colleges and research organizations have done the same, judging by the 2021 vintage of the Shanghai International Ranking published this Sunday. With four establishments in the Top 100, against five the previous year, France remains at the foot of the podium, tied with Germany and Canada, very far behind the United States (40), but within easy reach of the United Kingdom (8), China and Australia (7 each), as well as Switzerland (5).

France retains the first place in terms of establishments in continental Europe. For the second time in a row , Paris-Saclay is among the top 15 international universities, and even wins a march to occupy the 13^e. World champion in mathematics in the thematic list established by the Jiao-tong University of Shanghai, the establishment includes, among others, Paris-Sud, AgroParisTech and Centrale Supelec.

Various destinies

The other French champions have experienced varying fortunes in a year. After progressing 5 places in 2020, the Sorbonne University climbed 4 more to wait for the 35^e world rank. Paris Sciences et Lettres, which includes the ENS and Paris-Dauphine in particular, has dropped 2 (38^e). Paris-Descartes (Paris-V) and Paris-Diderot (Paris-VII), who united their destinies to form the University of Paris, also retreated (73^e place, -8). After entering the Top 100, Grenoble-Alpes finally came out.

The Shanghai ranking has existed since 2003. The top 1,000 universities are evaluated using half a dozen criteria: number of Nobel prizes and Fields medals among alumni or teacher-researchers, of the most cited researchers, of articles published in “Nature and Science”, articles indexed in “Science Citation Index-Expanded” and “Social Science Citation Index” as well as the academic performance of professors.

American domination

Its appearance has provoked many debates in France even if, since, it has ended up imposing itself in the landscape. However, we cannot reduce the quality of establishments to this classification alone. “It is a very classic classification in its conception, that is to say that it is based on quantitative measures such as the number of Nobel prizes, and does not take into account the other missions of universities such as the involvement local, the fight against inequality of opportunity, ”recalls Christine Musselin, CNRS research director at Sciences Po, specialist in higher education.

“It is not suddenly the quality of French science that has increased,” she tempers. The tendency to regroup already preexisting, it undoubtedly accelerated with the classification of Shanghai, which particularly benefited Paris-Saclay, at least for its international influence.

“More than ever, the new university models put in place in 2018 are proving their worth: three of the four French universities ranked in the Top 100 are thus the result of this policy of regrouping institutions”, reacted in a press release the Minister. of Higher Education, Research and Innovation, Frédérique Vidal.

For the rest, the Shanghai ranking is written in American, the most prestigious universities across the Atlantic – Harvard, Stanford, MIT, Berkeley or Princeton – occupying eight of the top 10 places in the world. The domination is not total since the two British champions maintain the flag high. Cambridge retains its bronze medal, while Oxford, now 7^e world, the luxury of gaining 2 places.