Institut français des relations internationales
The Institut français des relations internationales, known as IFRI, has hosted some of the most powerful figures in modern politics within its Paris conference rooms. Vladimir Putin, Hu Jintao, Hamid Karzai, Nicolas Sarkozy, and Dmitri Medvedev have all taken the floor at its gatherings. How does a French research institute with a staff of roughly 60 people draw heads of state and global leaders to Paris year after year? And what does it mean for a think tank to be genuinely independent in a world where research and power are rarely kept far apart? Those questions sit at the center of IFRI's story.
Thierry de Montbrial's path to founding IFRI began not with an abstract idea but with a government assignment. In 1973, Foreign Affairs Minister Michel Jobert, serving under President Georges Pompidou, placed de Montbrial in charge of setting up the Centre d'Analyse et de Prévision inside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. That work gave him an up-close view of how France processed information about the world, and it planted the idea of an independent institution that could do something similar without government constraints.
By 1979, that idea had taken concrete form. De Montbrial founded IFRI with backing from Prime Minister Raymond Barre and two successive Foreign Affairs Ministers, Louis de Guiringaud and Jean François-Poncet. He was drawing inspiration explicitly from American research institutions, which had long operated as bridges between academic expertise and policy practice. Marc Gilbert, formerly a producer of the television program Italiques at the Office de Radiodiffusion Télévision Française, took on the role of general secretary.
IFRI was not built from scratch. It was grafted onto an institution that already existed: the Centre d'Etudes de Politique Etrangère, which French universities and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace had founded in 1935. That heritage gave the new institute an intellectual lineage stretching back more than four decades before its own founding.
IFRI employs roughly 60 people, split almost evenly between French nationals and foreign researchers drawn from various backgrounds. More than half the staff are under 40 years old, which shapes the institute's research culture with a relatively young workforce anchored in contemporary global affairs.
The research itself is organized across two axes. One is geographic, with dedicated centers covering Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Maghreb, contemporary Turkey, the United States, Russia and neighboring states, and French-German relations. The other axis is thematic, addressing areas such as globalization and global economics, strategic and security issues, migrations and identity, energy geopolitics, and climate. Each center publishes its own collection, available online through the IFRI website.
Dominique Moïsi serves as a special advisor to the institute. The wider membership includes about 80 partner companies and nearly 400 members, drawn from private individuals as well as state bodies and NGO institutions.
IFRI's budget stood at roughly 6.5 million Euros in 2011, and the way that money is structured matters as much as its size. About 70 percent of funding comes from private sources, with the remainder drawn from subsidies and state contracts. That ratio is a deliberate choice: the institute holds no affiliation with any political party and is independent from administrative and financial regulatory authorities.
The institute publishes its list of partners and members online, making at least the roster of funders publicly visible. The blend of public and private money reflects a foundational conviction that intellectual independence requires diversified revenue. A research institution dependent on a single source, whether a government ministry or a single corporate patron, risks having its agenda shaped by that dependency.
In 2011, for the fourth consecutive year, IFRI ranked as the only French-based research institution listed among the top 50 most influential think tanks worldwide outside the United States. In Western Europe specifically, it placed third. Those rankings came from a study called "Global Go-To Think Tanks," produced by a research team at the University of Pennsylvania, which assessed more than 6,480 institutes operating across 169 countries.
That standing reflects a network built over decades. IFRI works regularly with partner institutions including the RAND Corporation, the Brookings Institution, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Japan Institute for International Affairs, the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, the French-Korean Foundation, and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Auswärtige Politik.
Beyond Paris, IFRI established a presence in Brussels in March 2005. The Brussels office, known as Ifri Bruxelles, organizes about 30 events each year. In Paris, the main institute holds around 40 conferences annually, a figure that reached 42 in 2011.
Ramsès, an annual collective work, has been published since 1981. It is dedicated to tracking the main global trends of each year, and its circulation runs around 10,000 copies. Alongside it sits Politique Etrangère, a quarterly magazine founded in 1936, which IFRI identifies as the first French magazine on international affairs. A special issue appeared in 2006 to mark the magazine's 70th anniversary.
Beyond those two flagship publications, IFRI produces shorter and more specialized works: the Notes de l'Ifri, Les Etudes de l'Ifri, and a shorter magazine called Actuelles de l'Ifri, as well as roughly ten online collections and books written by institute researchers. In 2012-12 books were published, four of them in foreign languages. That same year, IFRI issued 130 Notes d'Ifri, with half appearing in English, German, or Russian. The multilingual output signals that IFRI's audience extends well beyond France.
Common questions
When was Institut français des relations internationales founded?
IFRI was founded in 1979 by Thierry de Montbrial, with the support of Prime Minister Raymond Barre and Foreign Affairs Ministers Louis de Guiringaud and Jean François-Poncet. It was built on the existing Centre d'Etudes de Politique Etrangère, which dated to 1935.
Who founded IFRI and what inspired its creation?
Thierry de Montbrial founded IFRI in 1979. He was inspired by the American model of research institutions and had previously been tasked by Minister Michel Jobert in 1973 to set up the Centre d'Analyse et de Prévision at the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
What is IFRI's ranking among global think tanks?
In 2011, for the fourth consecutive year, IFRI was the only French-based institution ranked among the top 50 most influential think tanks worldwide outside the United States. It placed 3rd in Western Europe in the Global Go-To Think Tanks study, which assessed more than 6,480 institutes across 169 countries.
How is the Institut français des relations internationales funded?
IFRI's budget stood at roughly 6.5 million Euros in 2011. About 70 percent of that comes from private sources, with the remainder from state subsidies and contracts. The institute is independent from administrative and financial regulatory authorities and has no affiliation with any political party.
What publications does IFRI produce?
IFRI's two main publications are Ramsès, an annual report on global trends published since 1981 with a circulation of around 10,000 copies, and Politique Etrangère, a quarterly magazine founded in 1936. In 2012, IFRI also published 12 books and 130 Notes d'Ifri, half of which appeared in foreign languages including English, German, and Russian.
Which world leaders have spoken at IFRI events?
Past guest speakers at IFRI conferences have included Vladimir Putin, Hu Jintao, Nicolas Sarkozy, Dmitri Medvedev, Hamid Karzai, Pervez Musharraf, Paul Kagamé, and José Manuel Barroso, among others. IFRI organizes about 40 conferences each year in Paris.
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