Maths, Meritocracy and the Crisis of the Humanities in France

France’s relationship with the Humanities is intimate and long-standing. Its Literature has Molière, Hugo, Baudelaire, George Sand, Camus, while Rousseau, Descartes, Sartre, and De Beauvoir are some of Philosophy’s most influential names. Foucault and Durkheim were both foundational to the discipline of sociology, and the works of Bloch, Febvre, and the Annales school were key to new 20th century approaches to historical practice.  

However, for a country with such a close connection to the Humanities, France struggles to embrace this side of its intellectual heritage. Any budding Humanities student is disappointed by the uneven attention paid to these subjects by the national education system, especially in comparison to the Sciences. Their study is deemed useful and important only if it is taken to the highest level, and while this sounds like the ‘crisis of the Humanities’ fretted over by academics across the Western world, in France this culture is especially deep-rooted and connected to the regimented and meritocratic values of the country’s education system and professional sphere. 

As a Humanities student who went through the French schooling system, I can painfully vouch for the clear bias it places on the Sciences throughout secondary education. In France, if a student is somewhat clever, they are told that they should focus on Maths rather than on History; and if they do not then they are immediately deemed a ‘wasted talent’. Being told by your teachers that you will be a ‘waste’ is made even more amusing by the fact that the French actually force some form of Humanities upon all students. We are all required to take classes and sit final exams in Philosophy, Literature, History, and two languages. In spite of this, it is accepted by most of French society that compared to the Sciences, the Humanities are not as viable a project for undergraduate education, not as useful in the professional world. 

A simple explanation for these understandings of the Humanities is the stereotypical French obsession with Cartesian rigour. But they are also deeply embedded in societal frameworks. The role of the Humanities in the French education system can be explained by the intense meritocracy which underlies education and professional mobility in France: if the Education Nationale were to have a mantra, it would be ‘sink or swim’. As early as primary school, students are subjected to a rigid model of education which emphasises memorisation, acceptance of knowledge rather than a questioning of it, and very little development of supra-educational skills. The solution for a student who cannot keep up is quick and easy – almost one in three French students experience redoublement (resitting an academic year) at some point during their scholarity. It is a ruthless system, inherently unfair in being built to mould the future elites from a young age, rather than acknowledge and amend a student’s struggles. And it is this elitist construction of the system which frames educational and professional opportunity. 

The ultimate goal for most students is to gain access to the Holy Grail of French education: the Grandes Ecoles. These infamous institutions are essentially the only way into the country’s ruling elites. They include business schools such as HEC and ESSEC, the Polytechnique engineering schools, and the ENS schools which train researchers and professors in both the Sciences and Humanities (crucially, one of the only elite Ecoles to offer Humanities courses). The selection process is ridiculously competitive: admissions take the form of a nation-wide competition with the highest rankers being offered spots in the best schools, and students got to preparatory school after the Baccalauréat to work with unhealthy intensity to train for this exam. Of course, working 70+ hours per week and sacrificing your entire social life for two years straight all becomes worth it once you get admitted into one of the most prestigious Ecoles: set up for a career in the upper echelons of French bureaucracy, administration, or enterprise, you have been perfectly prepared for the ruthless competitivity of the professional environment. 

Operating within a clearly meritocratic system, the French are taught early on about the importance of success, and of the professional and social statuses which academic achievement can offer. With few high-end Humanities courses on offer and bleak job prospects for its students outside of academia or education (it’s a worldwide problem apparently), however, the ‘success’ these students have been conditioned for is hard to find in the Humanities sector. ENS graduates are in effect the only examples of individuals who can be deemed as ‘successful’ while having pursued an education in the Humanities, thus further reducing their appeal as a field of study. 

There are exceptions to this statement, but most individuals concerned are usually ENS graduates anyway. For example, a teacher or professor who manages to pass the famously intense Agrégation competition (a part-certification, part-status-symbol for teachers) is widely recognised as showcasing considerable intellect and prestige. Moreover, the persona of the public intellectual still holds great cultural appeal for the French. The Café de Flore and Les Deux Magots, two cafés in the 6th arrondissement of Paris, are famous as the rendezvous spots for 20th century thinkers such as Sartre, de Beauvoir, Camus, and Bataille; and in the 21st century individuals such as the philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy are well-known public figures. Today’s intellectuals are, however, appealing to the general public more through their lifestyles and status as an ‘intellectual’ rather than because of any public engagement with their works or ideas – the aesthetic of the freelance thinker who flits between cafés, wearing trendy haute-couture outfits and smoking Gauloises, is seen as obnoxiously French even by the French themselves. 

The study of Humanities is thus seen as worthwhile only if taken to the highest level – concretely it remains a domain of intellectual and academic importance only within the small circles of an elitist intelligentsia. Unfortunately, the extent to which this view is not just opinion but culture means that it is unlikely to shift in the direction of a greater integration of the Humanities into French society any time soon. 

 

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