École nationale d'administration

École nationale d'administration
Type Public
Established 1945
Director Nathalie Loiseau[1]
Administrative staff
 229
Undergraduates 0
Postgraduates 533 students
Location Strasbourg, France
Website www.ena.fr

The École nationale d'administration (ENA; French pronunciation: ​[ekɔl nasjɔnal dadministʁasjɔ̃]; English: National School of Administration), one of the French graduate schools (Grandes écoles), was created in 1945 by Michel Debre to democratise access to the senior civil service. It is now entrusted with the selection and initial training of senior French officials. It is one of the most prestigious and elitist French schools, not only for its acceptance rates (1/16 for the "concours externe") but especially because a large majority of the candidates already graduated from the best "Grandes écoles" of the country such as HEC Paris, ENS, Mines ParisTech, the Ecole Centrale Paris or the École Polytechnique.

The ENA is one of the symbols of the meritocracy, along with the other "Grandes écoles", offering its alumni access to high positions within the state. It has now been almost completely relocated to Strasbourg to emphasise its European character, and is now based in the former Commanderie Saint-Jean.

The ENA produces aroun 80 to 90 graduates every year, known as énarques (IPA: [enaʁk]). ENA is seen as the method of choice to reach the administrative Grand Corps of the State.

In 2002 the Institut international d'administration publique (IIAP) which educated foreign civil servants under a common structure with ENA was fused with it.

Origins

The Commanderie Saint-Jean, home of the École nationale d'administration

Access to senior position of the French civil service is threefold : first, through generalist positions which ENA leads to, second, through "technical" (engeeneering) positions, mainly after [École polytechnique]] or through internal promotion.

ENA was created to make recruitment for various high administrative bodies more rational and democratic. Before, each ministry had its own competitive exam and civil servant and this could led sometimes to some kind of nepotism or influences. According to the new approach, a system solely based on academic proficiency and competitive examinations, renders recruitment to top positions more transparent without suspicion of political or personal preference.

Recruitment and exit procedures

Admission to ENA is granted based a competitive examination at the beginning of September, which people generally take after completing studies at the Institut d'études politiques de Paris or any Prép'Ena (preparatory classes for the ENA examination for people coming from universities or grandes écoles). The "concours externe" exam is in two parts :

The written part includes
- an essay on public law
- an essay on the economy
- an essay on "general knowledge" (culture générale, common in French competitive exams),
- a note de synthèse (analyzing a 40 to 70 page document and proposing a brief for a Senior Executive [Minister or Director]) either on Social Law and Policies (Questions Sociales) or on European topics ("Questions européennes")
- three short questions on Public Finance.
The oral exam, taken only by those with the highest marks in the written exam, consists of
- An oral examination on International Politics (Questions Internationales)
- An oral examination either on Questions Européennes (European Law and Policies) or on Social Law and Policies.
- An oral examination to test the skill of the candidate in English.
- a 45-minute entrance exam, known as Grand Oral since any question can be asked, based on the CV given by the candidate.

Results of this exam process are published by the end of December.

Other exam processes govern admission for career civil servants (concours interne) and for all other people, already active in business, political or union activities (troisième concours).

ENA ranks students according to their academic merit; students are then asked, in order of decreasing merit, the service that they want to join. Top-ranked students usually join the so-called "grands corps" Inspection générale des finances, Conseil d'État or Cour des comptes, followed by the French Treasury and the diplomatic service. Other students will join various ministries and administrative justice or préfectures. To quote ENA's site:[2]

In fact, although these famous alumni are the most visible, the majority are largely unknown, lead quiet and useful careers in our civil service, and don't recognise themselves in the stereotyped images about our school.

Promotions

Academic years at ENA are known as promotions, and are named by the students after outstanding French (Vauban, Saint-Exupéry, Rousseau), Foreigners (Mandela), characters (Cyrano de Bergerac), battles (Valmy), concepts (Croix de Lorraine, Droits de l'homme) or values (liberté-égalité-fraternité).

This tradition comes from old French military schools such as the Ecole Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr.

Ranking

In 2011, the Mines ParisTech : Professional Ranking World Universities ranked the ENA 3rd best university in France and 9th in the world according to the number of alumni holding CEO position at Fortune Global 500 companies.

ENA and politics

Very few énarques (around 1%) actually get involved in politics. Most ENA alumni hold apolitical, technical positions in the French civil service. However, they are often the best known.

French law makes it relatively easy for civil servants to enter politics: civil servants who are elected or appointed to a political position do not have to resign their position in the civil service; instead, they are put in a situation of "temporary leave" known as disponibilité. If they are not re-elected or reappointed, they may ask for their reintegration into their service (see Lionel Jospin and Philippe Séguin for examples). In addition, ENA graduates are often recruited as aides by government ministers and other politicians; this makes it easier for some of them to enter a political career. As an example, Dominique de Villepin entered politics as an appointed official, after serving as an aide to Jacques Chirac, without ever having held an elected position.

The énarques were criticised as early as the 1960s for their technocratic and arrogant ways. Young énarque Jacques Chirac was, for instance, lampooned in an album of the Asterix series. Such criticism has continued up to present times, with the énarques being accused of monopolizing positions in higher administration and politics without having to show real competence. It has become a recurrent theme for many French politicians to criticise ENA, even when they themselves are alumni of the school.

ENA also participates in international Technical Assistance programmes, funded by the EU or other donors.

Alumni

According to an international classification, the École nationale d'administration ranks ninth among higher education institutions in the world, with regard to the performance of their training programmes, based on the number of alumni among the Chief Executive Officers of the 500 leading worldwide companies.[3]

Since its creation 60 years ago, the ENA has trained 5600 French senior officials and 2600 foreigners. Some famous alumni include:

International cooperation

Uzbekistan

An agreement was signed in Paris on 16 October 2012 between ENA and the Uzbek Academy of administration which envisages cooperation in modernization of state administration and improving skills of public servants on Uzbekistan. The first cooperation will begin in January 2013.[5]

See also

References

  1. ↑ La diplomate Nathalie Loiseau a été nommée mercredi 3 octobre 2012 en Conseil des ministres directrice de l'Ecole nationale d'administration (ENA), devenant ainsi la deuxième femme à diriger la prestigieuse école qui forme les hauts fonctionnaires
  2. ↑ "Accueil - ENA, Ecole nationale d'administration" (in French). Ena.fr. Retrieved 2012-05-23.
  3. ↑ Professionnal ranking of world universities PDF (286 KB), September 2007
  4. ↑ "The rise of the lawyers". The Economist. 2007-07-05. Retrieved 2007-07-11.
  5. ↑ "France to Assist the Uzbek Academy of Administration". The Gazette of Central Asia (Satrapia). 1 November 2012.

External links

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Coordinates: 48°34′50″N 7°44′14″E / 48.58056°N 7.73722°E / 48.58056; 7.73722

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