Hidden away on an unremarkable side street on the Left Bank in Paris is a university that fancies itself “the French Harvard.” One morning in March, the director of Sciences Po, Mathias Vicherat, who had taken office promising to combat sexual violence, resigned months after he and his ex-girlfriend went to the police accusing each other of domestic abuse. Vicherat became the school’s third consecutive director to leave (one in a coffin) in the shadow of personal or professional transgressions.
His departure was only Sciences Po’s second-biggest controversy of the week, behind a dispute between students over the war in Gaza. That row prompted French prime minister Gabriel Attal to make the 700-yard journey from his official residence to his old school’s council meeting to underline “the absolute necessity that the university remains a place of…healthy debates that respect the values of the republic.” Along with a spate of other recent scandals, the turmoil amounts to the most significant upheaval on Sciences Po’s campus in its 152-year history.
Meanwhile, President Emmanuel Macron, an alum, is busy committing patricide against his other alma mater, the tiny Ecole Nationale d’Administration, or ENA, where he went after Sciences Po. ENA has produced four of the last six occupants of the Elysée Palace, but it has become so widely despised as an elite nest that Macron pledged to abolish it. It turns out by abolish he just meant rename.
The French campus wars, like the American ones, are about much more than education. The French elite is fighting for survival, caught in a kind of civil war between generations, as well as the anger of the excluded 99 percent. The one percent, as in the U.S., has long been prepared in exclusive schools, which like the elite itself now face a choice: reform or die.
X MARKS THE SPOT
Esta historia es de la edición Summer 2024 de Town & Country US.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición Summer 2024 de Town & Country US.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
THE SPY Has to TRAVEL
Freck Vreeland was raised in privilege by a legendary arbiter of taste. He boarded at Groton, studied at Yale, and befriended Jackie Kennedy-then things got interesting. Here, ahead of his upcoming memoir, the high society secret agent tells all.
Game CHANGER
A century ago, Black Americans fell in love with bridge. Excluded from whites-only leagues, they made the game their own, and for a few exhilarating decades it played a starring role in the social and political lives of the burgeoning African-American middle and upper classes. Can its legacy survive in the modern age?
CHRONICLE OF A DISAPPEARANCE FORETOLD
The signs were everywhere. There was trouble at the San Antonio home of Brad and Suzanne Simpson. But when the mother and real estate agent went missing after a public fight with her husband at the exclusive Argyle club, a tony Texas enclave began to wonder if it had looked the other way for too long. Was discretion the true culprit in the still unsolved case?
What's Luck Got to Do with It?
Longevity in Hollywood can be elusive unless you're Angela Bassett. With a smart new series that puts her in the Oval Office and a summer blockbuster on the horizon, she delivers a master class in both elegance and endurance.
No Shrinking VIOLET
For a certain woman, this iconic scent has become as much an everyday wardrobe staple as her Cartier Tank and her Hermès scarf.
I Pledge Allegiance to THIS HOUSE
How a Charleston visionary came to love the demanding landmark she never wanted in the first place.
The College Counselor Rock Star Diaries
They command enormous fees to insert themselves in your teenager's life, choosing classes, extracurriculars-even summer activities-all in the pursuit of creating the perfect college candidate. Good luck getting one to see you.
The Cult of BACK PAIN
Membership in this highly undesirable club comes with its own lingo, syllabus, and gurus and now its very own antihero.
The Un-Tortured Artist
Robert Rauschenberg's compound on Captiva will once again serve as muse.
Where Is My Bodyguard?
Those four anxious little words are suddenly everywhere, casting a spotlight on the shadowy and booming business of executive protection.
