Sciences-po Grenoble: 5 minutes to understand the Klaus Kinzler affair

Sciences-po Grenoble has been a regular guest in the media for months.

You have to go back to more than a year ago to understand how the management ended up suspending one of its teachers, accused of having made defamatory remarks against him.

Klaus Kinzler, professor of German within the establishment, had been mentioned by name last March on posters plastered on the walls of the IEP, accused of "Islamophobia" and fascism.

How did this business start?

It all started in November 2020. In the midst of the second Covid wave, a “week for equality and the fight against discrimination” is being prepared remotely.

Several working groups involving teachers and students have been set up within this framework.

It is in one of its groups that dissensions will be revealed between Mr. Kinzler and one of his colleagues about the title of the debates for which their group is in charge: "Racism, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia".

In e-mail exchanges, Klaus Kinzler considers it inappropriate to classify the notion of Islamophobia at the same level with racism and anti-Semitism.

He confides in particular that he does not like Islam "very much", which frankly scares him "as it scares many French people".

Her colleague objects to her arguments.

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Their exchanges, of which the students of the group are also recipients, end up degenerating. The director of the IEP, Sabine Saurugger asks Mr. Kinzler to apologize to his colleague, which he will do twice by email. The term Islamophobia is removed from the title of the debates.

But the pressure will quickly go up a notch. On December 7, between two emails of apology from Klaus Kinzler, the management board of the PACTE laboratory, to which the teacher is attached, published a press release (since deleted). Its director, Anne-Laure Amilhat Szary, wishes to affirm "her refusal of any aggressive behavior and any argument of authority in the scientific debate". She adds that “the political instrumentalisation of Islam and the progression of racist opinions in our society legitimize the mobilization of the term

in scientific and public debate. "

A few weeks later, elected representatives of the Union Syndicale student union in turn published a text in which they revealed extracts from the emails attributed to the professor.

The union calls on the management of the establishment to "rule on its case".

He filed a complaint on February 27 for union discrimination.

It will be closed without follow-up.

Why has she degenerated?

On March 4, 2021, collages are displayed in the premises of the IEP in Grenoble. Klaus Kinzler and one of his colleagues are mentioned by name. Tension escalates. "Pig Sciences", "fascists in our lecture halls", "Islamophobia kills", we can read. Students publish photos of these writings on social networks. The student union Unef also relayed the operation on social networks before retracting. The names of the two teachers are thrown away. They are placed under police protection. An investigation is launched.

The affair then takes on a media dimension. Klaus Kinzler is invited on several television sets to deliver his version of the facts. On March 9, he appeared on CNews in Pascal Praud's show. The presenter openly criticizes Anne-Laure Amilhat Szary. He says he sees in her "the intellectual terrorism that exists in the university". Klaus Kinzler adds, describing her as "a great researcher director of a research laboratory [who] sets himself apart from science". Who "does not understand the science".

In turn, the director of the laboratory finds herself harassed on social networks.

She asks for functional protection which is quickly granted to her by her supervisory authority, the president of the University of Grenoble-Alpes.

She filed a sexist defamation and defamation complaint against her colleague and Pascal Praud.

But also for "threat of death" and "cyberstalking".

How did the management react?

After the posters were distributed, the director of the Grenoble IEP, Sabine Saurugger, considered that they endangered "not only the lives of the two colleagues, but also all the student communities, teachers and administrative staff".

And to continue, referring to Klaus Kinzler: "I think that there is a tone which is extremely problematic in his remarks, with ideas which are sometimes developed a little quickly, and therefore a call to order and an incitement to dialogue. have been undertaken ”, by management.

Sabine Saurugger also considered that the request made by Klaus Kinzler to the students of his group members of the Union Syndicale to leave his classes was "clearly discriminatory".

Frédérique Vidal, the Minister in charge of Higher Education, tastes little of these declarations.

Earlier, she had requested a report from the general inspectorate to shed light on the unfolding of the facts.

On BFMTV, she said she regretted the attitude of the student union, which according to her should have been confined to its role, that "of being in mediation, not of throwing people into the pasture on social networks".

What are the conclusions of the general inspection?

In its conclusions, delivered on May 8, the General Inspectorate argued "that all those involved in this affair have committed errors of appreciation, clumsiness, lapses and faults, more or less serious, more or less numerous". Some management inexperience is noted. She believes that Klaus Kinzler "damaged the image and reputation of the teaching staff and, beyond that, of the establishment, discredited a body of the Institute". The inspectorate recommends sending him a final call to order.

For the inspection, Anne-Laure Amilhat Szary should have been notified "of the faults she committed in this lamentable affair".

She is accused of having dramatized the controversy in her press release of December 7.

But also for having forced the teaching staff to take a stand in this matter and to choose their side.

"We end up with assaulted and aggressors sent back to the same types of sanctions, it is very problematic", she then commented to our colleagues from the World.

"The minister publicly expressed her indignation and support when the names of my colleagues were posted, but did not react when I was in turn dangerously threatened",

she continued.

A case that has become political

With less than four months of the presidential election, the Klaus Kinzler affair has taken on a political dimension. The management of the establishment has just suspended the professor, accused of having made defamatory remarks against the establishment during his appearances on television. Launched in a real crusade against the practices which would be in progress within the IEP of Grenoble for several months, Klaus Kinzler had notably described the school as an institute of "political re-education", accusing a "hard core" of his colleagues to indoctrinate students into the culture of "wokism", in the face of powerless leadership. In her suspension order, the director Sabine Saurugger considers that the teacher has "seriously disregarded several obligations", in particular in terms of "professional discretion".

This sanction made several political figures jump. In a column published by our colleagues in the Opinion, the deputy François Jolivet asks for the institution to be placed under supervision, as well as the opening of a parliamentary commission of inquiry into the situation of French universities. At Les Républicains, Valérie Pécresse says she is worried "that freedom of expression is no longer guaranteed at IEP Grenoble" and asks Frédérique Vidal to initiate a new inspection mission on the situation. It was followed by Éric Ciotti, the MEP François-Xavier Bellamy and the president of the Rhône-Alpes region Laurent Wauquiez. In a press release, he announced his decision to suspend all region funding to the facility. A decision hailed by Marine Le Pen on social networks.

In a press release, the management of the establishment denounces a political decision.

She specifies that “the financial support of the region (…) does not consist of grants but essentially in the allocation of scholarships to students”.

She calls on Laurent Wauquiez to reconsider his decision in the interest of the students.

"The Grenoble-UGA IEP is now the subject of inept accusations of

, of

or even of

, which have no basis," the statement continued.