It has become a familiar refrain: Learning institutions in France have allegedly been colonized by "woke-ism," gender studies and intersectionality. This accusation has been repeated over several years now, stirred up by polemicists, echoed by ministers and even some intellectual circles. It has been further championed by the book Face à l'obscurantisme woke ("Facing Woke Obscurantism"), which is due to be published on April 30. One of its co-directors, Xavier-Laurent Salvador, had already stated in Le Figaro newspaper, in 2021, that "decolonialism and identitarian ideologies represent a quarter of research in the humanities today."

The Observatory of Decolonialism and Identity Ideologies was created in 2021 based on these repeated allegations. It is now funded by far-right billionaire Pierre-Edouard Stérin, and has been renamed the Observatory of University Ethics.

Two "reports on ideological manifestations in universities and research," published by the observatory in 2021 and 2023, compile scientific articles, thesis abstracts, press articles and conferences dedicated to gender and other "woke" themes. Despite the accumulation effect, the lack of any quantitative analysis makes it impossible to gauge what these works truly represent as a proportion of overall academic output, let alone measure any potential increase.

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