One among France’s most elite universities discovered itself with out a chief for the second time in simply three years on Wednesday after its director, Mathias Vicherat, resigned to face a court docket case over accusations of home violence.
The college, Sciences Po in Paris, has produced 5 of France’s final eight presidents and over a dozen prime ministers, in addition to high enterprise leaders, well-known journalists and scores of high-ranking civil servants. It has been striving to develop even stronger by diversifying its pupil physique and competing internationally for college students.
However the resignation of Mr. Vicherat, 45, who denied any wrongdoing and mentioned he was stepping down to guard Sciences Po’s standing, was the most recent in a collection of episodes of inner turmoil which have tarnished the varsity’s status.
Mr. Vicherat’s predecessor, Frédéric Mion, stepped down in 2021 after admitting that he had not taken motion towards a longtime professor and board member regardless of figuring out of incest allegations towards him; an investigation into the professor by prosecutors was later dropped as a result of the statute of limitations had expired. The varsity’s earlier director, Richard Descoings, was discovered lifeless in a Manhattan lodge room in 2012 — a demise that was adopted by an embarrassing authorities audit over the varsity’s use of public funds.
Sciences Po mentioned in a press release on Wednesday that it had “taken word” of Mr. Vicherat’s resignation “to safeguard the establishment,” however didn’t touch upon the unrest surrounding his departure.
Laurence Bertrand Dorléac, who heads the Nationwide Basis of Political Sciences, a personal entity that oversees the college’s price range and governing technique, mentioned in a message to school members and college students {that a} provisional administration could be appointed within the coming days.
“We are going to all be united round our core values, our missions of analysis, instructing and help for our college students, the sleek operating of the establishment and your best option for its management,” Ms. Bertrand Dorléac mentioned.
Mr. Vicherat, a civil servant who beforehand labored at Paris’s Metropolis Corridor, France’s nationwide railway firm and Danone, a French meals large, took the helm of Sciences Po in 2021, vowing to prioritize efforts to stop sexual violence and sexism. However that promise was marred in December when the French information media reported that he and his former associate, the movie director Anissa Bonnefont, had briefly been detained by the police after every accused the opposite of home violence.
Though neither filed formal fees, prosecutors pursued the case. On Wednesday, the Paris prosecutor’s workplace didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark, and it was not clear when a trial is perhaps held.
Ms. Bonnefont posted on social media in December expressing shock and asking for privateness. “{Couples}’ unhappiness belongs to {couples},” she wrote, “and it’s by no means all white on one aspect and all black on the opposite.”
The accusations led to an outcry towards Mr. Vicherat, who quickly stepped apart earlier than returning to the varsity in late January underneath sure situations set by college officers. Some college students led sit-ins or put up posters to demand his departure.
In an emailed assertion to college students and college members on Wednesday, Mr. Vicherat mentioned that he had determined to step down as a result of he and Ms. Bonnefont had been ordered to face trial earlier than a legal court docket.
“I nonetheless deny the accusations of violence which have been made towards me,” he mentioned, noting that the court docket case was continuing “with none grievance ever being filed by both aspect.”
“As I’ve already written, it’s much less my particular person than the establishment that issues to me, which is why I’ve determined, as a way to protect it, to resign from my duties as president of the Institut d’études politiques de Paris,” he added, utilizing the formal identify for Sciences Po, which he known as an “admirable establishment.”
Pupil unions that had expressed anger over his temporary return welcomed his resignation. One, the Union Étudiante, known as his departure “late” however “unavoidable.”
Mr. Vicherat’s resignation occurred amid “a very tense local weather for the establishment, whose administration has utterly misplaced legitimacy within the seriousness and sincerity of its struggle towards sexist and sexual violence,” the union mentioned in a press release, including that his successor must “actively have interaction” in that struggle.
