Josselin Droff and Julien Malizard were involved in the Conflicts, economic issues and institutional changes« study day», organised on 25 October 2024 at the House of Human and Social Sciences (MSH), A support and research unit (UAR 3258) supported by the CNRS and the universities of Paris 8 and Sorbonne Paris Nord.
Entitled «A la recherche de l'instrument budgétaire idéal : Chronologie de la budgétisation des OPEX françaises» ("In search of the ideal budgetary instrument: a chronology of the budgeting of French OPEX"), this paper is also part of the ANR-22-CE53-0007 PolisInWar project supported by the French National Research Agency (ANR) and led by Jean Joana, Professor of Political Science at the University of Montpellier.
Josselin Droff and Julien Malizard addressed the issue of the cost of external operations (OPEX) and more specifically of their budgeting in a particularly tight financial context (State budget, public debt).
Against a backdrop of discussions on «the war economy» and monitoring of the 2024-2030 military programming law (LPM), they proposed a reflection on the intensity and cost of commitments of France :
- France's commitments, including the extra cost now exceeds 1.2 billion euros per year, In the last few years, the average duration of the programme has increased; ;
- In a historical perspective, the extra cost of external operations when compared with the cost of the same operations in the same country. macroeconomic variables like the State budget or GDP remains low; ;
- Nevertheless, in a a true budget perspective, The financing of operations has major repercussions on the management of the Ministry's budget (intra-budgetary arbitration, opportunity cost); ;
- In addition to the problems of financing, the increase in commitments raises the question of sustainability of operations and long-term army model.
