Between "Shanghai" and "Leiden" Rankings: Where Do French Universities Stand Globally?

With each academic year approaching in August, academia and students, including members of the expatriate community and residents in France, eagerly anticipate the release of the renowned Shanghai Ranking (ARWU). This global ranking combines several criteria into a single composite score relative to Harvard University, which topped the list with 100 points, while Paris-Saclay University emerged as the leading French institution, ranking 13th globally with 50.8 points.

Transparency Criticisms and a European Alternative

The Shanghai Ranking faces increasing criticism over the opacity of its methodology, in addition to charging exorbitant subscription fees for those wishing to access the precise ranks of institutions placed beyond the top 100. In this context, a non-profit laboratory at Leiden University in the Netherlands took the initiative to launch a ranking grounded in fully transparent and verifiable criteria without aggregating results into a single score, allowing institutions and students to explore diverse lists and accurately compare areas of excellence.

The Presence of French Universities

On Wednesday, November 4, the Dutch laboratory released its new edition, covering more than 3,000 universities worldwide, thus surpassing the coverage of the Shanghai Ranking, which evaluates 2,500 institutions and publishes results for only the top 1,000. The assessment showed that Harvard also leads in scientific impact and the proportion of open-access research, while dropping to second place in the international collaboration indicator behind the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing.

A total of 26 French universities are evaluated across both the Shanghai and Leiden rankings. Despite praise for the new European alternative, Laurent Chagnon, a bibliometrics engineer at PSL University, noted that the Leiden Ranking relies primarily on scientific publications and research without incorporating other significant educational and academic dimensions; nonetheless, it remains a prominent reference for understanding the standing of French higher education on the international stage.