History
The CNRS was created on October 19, 1939 by decree of President Albert Lebrun. Since 1954, the centre has annually awarded gold, silver, and bronze medals to French scientists and junior researchers. In 1966, the organisation underwent structural changes, which resulted in the creation of two specialised institutes: the National Astronomy and Geophysics Institute in 1967 (which became the National Institute of Sciences of the Universe in 1985) and the Institut national de physique nucléaire et de physique des particules (IN2P3; English: National Institute of Nuclear and Particle Physics) in 1971.
The performance of the CNRS has been questioned, with calls for wide-ranging reforms. In particular, the effectiveness of the recruitment, compensation, career management, and evaluation procedures have been under scrutiny. Governmental projects include the transformation of the CNRS into an organ allocating support to research projects on an ad hoc basis and the reallocation of CNRS researchers to the universities. Another controversial plan advanced by the government involves breaking up the CNRS into six separate institutes.
Read more about this topic: French National Centre For Scientific Research
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