The Conseil des rectrices et recteurs francophones (Cref) expresses its deep concern at the increasingly frequent attacks on universities, which are undermining one of the essential foundations of any democratic society.
While these attacks take a variety of forms - discrediting campaigns on social networks aimed at researchers or institutions, public questioning of scientific expertise, political or budgetary pressure on certain areas of research, attempts to interfere in teaching content, or media stigmatization of fields of study deemed "ideological" - what they have in common is that they target what the university represents: a place for debate, doubt, criticism and research. In a context of political polarization and societal tensions, certain actors are seeking either to impose their own narratives, or to silence those of others.
These attacks are part of a discursive climate increasingly marked by the disqualification and stigmatization of various social categories, including researchers and academics, who are sometimes reduced to the figure of "self-proclaimed intellectuals".
This type of discourse, based on populist tendencies, is in tension with the fundamental values of democratic debate. It contributes to accentuating social divisions and artificially pitting citizens against each other, to the detriment of social cohesion and enlightened deliberation. This logic, often summed up by the adage "divide and rule", weakens the very conditions of democratic coexistence.
It is worrying to note that these postures are not isolated, but form part of a broader dynamic observed in several regions of the world. In some contexts, notably in the USA, scientific work is openly called into question in favor of simplifying or ideologically-oriented narratives, contributing to the emergence of a form of "post-truth" that marginalizes critical reason and knowledge based on proven methods. Free thought, scientific doubt and the search for knowledge based on scientific consensus are sometimes disqualified as the hallmarks of disconnected, even suspect, elites.
From this perspective, the temptation appears to be to subordinate research to immediate, mainly economic ends, or to subject the production of knowledge to political arbitrations defining what is useful, legitimate, true or false. Such an orientation is incompatible with the very essence of scientific activity.
Like journalism, which plays a crucial role in informing citizens, scientific research aims to observe, analyze and understand the world in all its complexity. This mission cannot be fulfilled without the full guarantee of academic freedom. This implies the absence of ideological, political or economic pressure, the acceptance of uncertainty and the promotion of doubt as a driving force for the advancement of knowledge - in the spirit of semper quaerens, the foundation of the scientific process.
The University, and through it academic freedom, is one of the pillars of a democratic society geared towards shared progress, in the service of the greatest number, which must be protected.
Communiqué of the Rectors’ Council of February 4, 2026
The French-speaking rectors are concerned about the abuses that are undermining one of the foundations of our democracy: the University
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