Paris Nanterre University
Paris Nanterre University, formerly University of Paris West, Paris-X and commonly referred to as Nanterre, is a public research university based in Nanterre, Hauts-de-Seine, France, in the Paris metropolitan area. It is one of the most prestigious French universities, mainly in the areas of law, humanities, political science, social and natural sciences and economics. It is one of the thirteen successor universities of the University of Paris. The university is located in the western suburb of Nanterre, in La Défense area, the business district of the Paris area.
Paris Nanterre University alumni include more than 15 cabinet officials, heads of state or government from France and around the world, like Emmanuel Macron, Nicolas Sarkozy and Dominique de Villepin. Alumni also include heads of central banks, legislators and business people, like Christine Lagarde, Dominique Strauss-Kahn or Vincent Bolloré.The Nanterre campus of the University of Paris
The Nanterre campus was built in the 1960s on the outskirts of Paris as an extension of the University of Paris. On November 2, 1964, the Nanterre Faculty of Arts and Humanities opened as an annex to the Faculty of Arts of the University of Paris, which it relieved. It became one of the largest teaching campuses in Paris.
Nanterre became famous shortly after its opening by being at the center of the May '68 student rebellion. The campus was nicknamed "Nanterre, la folie" or "Nanterre la rouge".
When it was founded in 1965, Nanterre “raised great hopes” and “was to be a place of experimentation for renewed teaching, the outline of tomorrow's university”, benefiting from the contribution of “famous professors” who “voluntarily left the University of Paris to take part in the Great Adventure”. Henri Lefebvre, professor of sociology from 1965 to 1968, influenced the students who initiated the May 68 movement, and then provided an on-the-spot analysis of the events.
These “great hopes” were soon disappointed. To be modern, “it's not enough to use concrete and glass”, as one student would denounce four years later, quoted by L'Express. In 1964, Nanterre was home to 2,300 students, and by 1968 it was expected to absorb 12,000.Paris-X, then the University of Paris West
It was set up as an independent university in December 1970 as "University of Paris-X". Based on the American model, it was created as a campus. When the new autonomous university was created, the Ville-d'Avray University Technical Institute was attached to it.
In 1985 and 1989, decentralized branches were founded. In 1984, the promulgation of the Savary law, which created the current university departments, led to the opening of a satellite campus in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines in 1985, followed in 1989 by the opening of another satellite campus in Cergy-Pontoise. In 1991, the University of Versailles - Saint-Quentin and the University of Cergy-Pontoise became full-authority universities.
In the 1980s and 2000s, the university was the scene of student protests. In 2008, the University of Paris-X became the "University of Paris West".The Paris Nanterre University
In 2016, it became "Paris Nanterre University". During the same year, the new Max Weber Humanities and Social Sciences Centre was inaugurated. It includes 1 amphitheater, several meeting rooms and 124 offices, mainly for teacher-researchers.
In September 2023, five "Youth with Macron" activists were attacked by a dozen militants from the ultra-left group La Jeune Garde, who had come to put up posters for a demonstration "against police violence".
In November of the same year, in reaction to the Gaza war, pro-Palestinian and anti-Semitic tags proliferated on the university campus.Campus
Nanterre is the second largest campus in France after Nantes, with its own Olympic-sized swimming pool and a stadium. It welcomes 35,000 to 40,000 students every year in all fields of studies: Social Sciences, Philosophy, Literature, History, Languages and Linguistics, Economics, Law and Political Sciences, as well as Teacher Training, Acting, Cinema, Physiology and Sports.
The university's facilities:
- La Contemporaine Library and Museum;
- Le Pixel Library;
- the Bernard-Marie Koltès Theater;
- and the University Sports Centre.
The university is known for its speciality in the fields of Law and Economics. Even though French universities are required by law to admit anyone with a Baccalauréat, strain is put on the students from the start and the first year drop-out rate consistently hovers in the 60% region. At the postgraduate level, the university offers very competitive programs and partnerships with some grandes écoles such as the Ecole Polytechnique, ESSEC, Ecole des Mines de Paris, and ESCP Europe among others.
The Rene Ginouves Institute for Archaeology and Anthropology is another important institution on campus, merging the departments of the CNRS, Paris I-Panthéon Sorbonne and Paris X-Nanterre.
As in most Parisian universities, there is a large minority of foreign exchange students.Innovative programs
Over the years, Nanterre has developed innovative programs such as the double bilingual courses in French Law and Anglo-American, Spanish, Russian, German or Italian law; in Economics & Management ; and in History. These programs have inspired many universities and grandes écoles throughout the country and are now renowned on a national level.Nanterre Network
The Franco-German Summer and Winter Universities with higher education institutions of third countries are an expression of the increasing internationalization of studies and research. In legal sciences, the management of the Franco-German studies at the University of Paris Nanterre plays a pioneering role in the establishment of Summer and Winter Universities. Thus, within the framework of its Europe-wide network for university cooperation, in collaboration with German and other foreign partners, Summer and Winter universities have been emerging since 2004 in Central and Eastern Europe, in the Balkans and in the Mediterranean region − with financial support from the German-French University, the Franco-German Youth Service and the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research. Since 2013, these tri-national Summer and Winter Universities have also extended to non-European countries.Objectives, function and functional principles of the Summer and Winter Universities
In September 2012, Bernard Cazeneuve, France's Deputy Minister for European Affairs and patron of the 2nd Franco-German Summer University for Energy and Environmental Law at the University of Paris Nanterre, saw in this type of Summer University a “successful” approach to bridge the lecture-free period; approach which can even be “exported” and is therefore “conducive to the prestige of Franco-German cooperation in Europe”.Lithuania
The oldest trinational Summer University in Vilnius, Lithuania, focuses on EU legal harmonization. It was founded in 2004 by the University of Paris Nanterre, the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University in Frankfort on the Main and the University of Vilnius in the year of EU enlargement to countries particularly in Central and Eastern Europe. With their accession, the Baltic States were obliged to take over the entire law of the EU and to implement the goals of the political Union as well as those of the economic and monetary Union. In the first few years, this Summer University was the joint end-of-year event for two binational law schools: the German-Lithuanian Law School and the Franco-Lithuanian Law School.Belarus
The Summer University in Minsk, founded in 2011 by the universities of Paris Nanterre, Potsdam and the Belarusian State University, is devoted to topics of general European relevance, such as “alternative dispute resolution”, “new information and communication technologies”, environmental issues and other current issues. As in the EU, in the post-Soviet Community of Independent States the tendency towards regional integration goes hand in hand with the attempt to harmonize national legal systems. Belarus is part of the Russian-Belarusian Union and a member of the Eurasian Economic Union.Balkan countries
The Franco-German Summer University founded in 2014 by the University of Paris Nanterre and the Westphalian Wilhelms-University of Münster with the Balkan region has an itinerant character. It takes place through several sessions with changing locations: starting in 2014 at the University of St. Cyril and Methodius Skopje, the University of Pristina and the European University of Tirana. Since then, the scientific and intercultural dialogue between universities from EU countries and from countries in the Balkans has intensified and expanded to other destinations in the region, through the progressive inclusion of new partner universities. Based on the self-image of both – of Western Balkan states candidate to EU accession, as well as that of the EU member states - the prospects of development of North Macedonia, Kosovo, Albania, Montenegro and other Western Balkan countries are discussed. The itinerant Summer University should determine to what extent the candidates already meet or will be able to meet the Copenhagen criteria for accession to the EU in the various legal areas concerned.Turkey
Founded in January 2016 by the University of Paris Nanterre, the Friedrich Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuremberg and the University of Yeditepe Istanbul, this first German-French-Turkish Winter University in Istanbul is devoted to the theory and practice of private law enforcement. Against the background of the hesitant negotiations between the EU and the permanent candidate Turkey since 2005, this issue is of great relevance for European Union law and the law of its member states, and for Turkish law. As a result of the tense domestic political situation in Turkey, the Winter University has not yet continued. After the failed coup against the Turkish president in July 2016, the state wave of cleansing did not omit the universities. The professors affected also included colleagues who were responsible for the cooperation with the French and German partner universities.