Public service : a symbolic step towards diversity

Editorial of the ” World “. In 2001, Sciences Po, Paris had shoved the small, closed world of the great schools in the French-creating a specific competition reserved for the high school students of the priority education zones. Twenty years later, Emmanuel Macron had to announce on Thursday 11 February, that seats are reserved for candidates from low-income backgrounds in the contest of the senior civil service.

It took two decades to accomplish what no ant, while fractures of social, academic, land has ceased to dig in France. The conclusion is unfortunately clear : in terms of social diversity in courses leading to positions of responsibility, the country stood still.

Between 2006 and 2016, the institutions that form the future elite of the administrative, scientific, and entrepreneurship have not expanded their recruitment pool, indicates a study revealed by The World. The children of workers and the unemployed, which represent 36 % of a class of age, reached a plateau at 10 % in the great schools, a proportion that is stagnant. The State, which funds many of them, has its share of responsibility. Has the national School of administration (ENA), who admitted to 1 % of children of workers in 2019 (versus 4% in 2006), it even has all the levers.

Advanced is lilliputienne

The device announced on Thursday by the president of the Republic is to create competition “talent” is specifically reserved for students selected on criteria not only academic but social and territorial. They will be equipped with a maximum of 15 % of the spaces are open to contest the external of the five schools of the senior civil service. Preparatory classes and aid devoted to the public will be multiplied. Has the ENA, six places will be as well “arrow” in 2021 for the benefit of young people.

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not wanting to be accused of introducing a “positive discrimination” and a rupture of equality, the Elysee specifies that the tests will be the same as those passed by other students, and that the places “talents” that are additional. The path chosen between formal equality and boost targeted, is symbolic of a crafty ” at the same time “. The State, finally, provides an example, and this is not nothing. But the progress is lilliputienne.

It is necessary to denounce the hypocrisy that presents the contest, accessible reality to the public handpicked with the key of the entry to the best high schools and preparatory classes, as a supreme model of equality. Some schools, including Sciences Po Paris, have recently taken a step further towards diversity, introducing competition based not on essays, but on a folder to recover all types of track, supplemented by an oral one.

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” We built our own separatism “, and lamented rightly Emmanuel Macron in his speech at les Mureaux (Yvelines), October 2, 2020, calling on them to “wake up” a Republic was able to hold ” his promises of emancipation “. The diagnosis is right. But the country will not be satisfied with rhetoric and symbolic measures. The president, if he really wants to balance the repressive measures contained in the bill”, confirming the compliance with the principles of the Republic ” by measures of social justice, must be addressed in all areas – housing, schools, employment – the different forms, structural or unconscious, of the between-self. Aggravated by the confinement generated by the social networks, they undermine the Republic and the threat.

The World

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