50 Years Anniversary of CAPS Celebrated at the "Nuit des Idées" 2025
On May 23, 2025, the Centre for Analysis, Planning and Strategy (CAPS) celebrated its 50th anniversary during the Night of Ideas, held at the Quai d’Orsay under the theme “Empower to Act.” This exceptional evening brought together diplomats, researchers, international partners, former CAPS members, and guests from the PIPA Program.
A Day of Strategic Reflection
The CAPS anniversary took the form of a day of strategic discussions at the Minister’s Residence, opened by a speech from the Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Jean-Noël Barrot. In his remarks, the Minister addressed current upheavals challenging three pillars of the international order: the primacy of law, “soft commerce,” and the resilience of liberal democracies. He also praised recent CAPS work on climate, U.S. foreign policy, alliance realignments, and its contributions to the National Strategic Review and the AI Action Summit.
Four round tables structured the day:
U-Turn: How to Anticipate the Strategic Shift of the United States?
Discussions highlighted American transactional logic, its impact on Europe, and the EU’s need to strengthen its strategic autonomy.
New Deal: How to Rethink Our Relations with the Global South?
Participants advocated for cooperation based on listening, respect for plural narratives, and a new multilateralism rooted in shared interests beyond spheres of influence.
Tipping Points: What Are the Strategic Implications of Climate Change?
The climate dimension was addressed as a structuring geopolitical issue, from energy security and critical minerals to environmental governance.
From the Border Between War and Peace: What Are the New Faces of the Enemy?
How should conflict be rethought in a hybrid world? The discussion focused on diffuse threats, ambiguous adversaries, and the need to reinvent thinking about both enemies and allies.
Cross-Testimonies: Living Memory of CAPS
The day also featured remarks from key figures who helped shape CAPS’s identity.
On this occasion, leading figures from the CAPS, the PIPA Laureate Ms. Benti and other guests, shared their insights on major international and diplomatic issues.
To follow their interventions in English, enable the subtitles (CC icon) and select “English” in the settings.
Tristan Aureau, Director of CAPS, emphasized the center’s openness to civil society and academia.
Hana Tehelku BENTI (PIPA laureate, invited in July 2025) shared her impressions of the program, highlighting its ability to bring together public and private entities, align institutions around common goals for France, the European Union, and African countries including Ethiopia, and its remarkable representation of women across sectors from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to the financial industry.
Michel Duclos (Special Advisor at Institut Montaigne, Deputy Director of CAPS from 1984 to 1987) highlighted policy planning as a bold forecasting exercise, recalling his work on German reunification and relations with the Global South.
Célia Belin (Director of ECFR’s Paris office, former CAPS advisor) described CAPS as a space for intellectual breathing, open to external ideas through programs like PIPA.
Johanna Bouyé (CAPS advisor) highlighted the value of synergies between diplomats and researchers, citing her field experience in Ukraine as a valuable analytical complement.
Justin Vaïsse (Director of CAPS from 2013 to 2019) emphasized CAPS’s ability to produce unconventional ideas and make French diplomacy more creative and incisive.
Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer (Ambassador to Vanuatu, former CAPS advisor) reaffirmed the center’s intellectual independence in strategic decision-making.
A highlight of the day revisited the history of CAPS, initiated by Michel Jobert, Thierry de Montbrial, and Jean-Louis Gergorin. Conceived from the outset as a “thorn in the side” of the Quai d’Orsay, CAPS has always aimed to offer critical analyses of France’s international stances and take on the challenge of anticipation, encouraging diplomats to move beyond the comfort of conventional thinking.
Conclusion
This anniversary was an opportunity to reflect on the ground covered by CAPS and to reaffirm its role at the heart of French strategic thinking — at a time when international uncertainty calls more than ever for foresight and strong proposals.
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