Donatienne Hissard appointed Director-General of Campus France

Donatienne Hissard has been appointed Director-General of Campus France by decree from French president Macron on 11 May 2022. She takes over Olivier Chiche-Portiche, who covered the interim period of the Directorate-General since the end of the second mandate of Béatrice Khaiat, Director-General from 2015 to March 2022.

A specialist of Asia and global challenges, Donatienne Hissard has 22 years of experience in diplomacy and professions in relation with international cooperation in France and abroad (Belgium, China, Italy). She worked until her appointment at the head of Campus France as Assistant Director for Sustainable Development at the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs.

Alumna of the Institut national des langues orientales and Sciences Po, Donatienne Hissard started her career as desk officer for China at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2000-2003), then worked at the European Commission where she was a national expert in the Directorate-General for External Relations (2003-2004). She worked in various departments in multilateral diplomacy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs: as desk officer in the Human rights department of the UN Directorate (2004-2006), assistant to the deputy director for the Nuclear decommissioning and non-proliferation (2009-2010) before working as assistant to the Permanent Representative of France to the United Nations in charge of agriculture and food in Rome. As former technical cooperation attaché (2006-2007), then assistant advisor in cultural cooperation and action (2007-2009) at the French embassy in China, she has a deep knowledge of the French cooperation network abroad and the stakes of cultural and university influence. As deputy director to scientific cooperation and exchanges of the ministry from 2010 to 2012, she launched the first French strategy on scientific diplomacy and managed a network of 150 scientific advisors and attachés in French embassies and 27 research centres in human and social science.

After she returned from expatriation in 2016, she worked at the Quai d’Orsay as career advisor for higher ranking managers at the Ministry, before becoming Deputy Director at the sustainable development department of the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, where she supervised the policies of public support to French development and agencies in charge of their implementation. This was ere job until her nomination as new Director-General of Campus France Agency, announced at the Official Journal of 12 May 2022.

She brings a diverse experience of sustainable development, governance and international organisations, and of the strategic supervision of public institutions, human resources and management.

I am honoured to take the lead of such a professional agency like Campus France, at an exciting time when the challenging of the mobility flows of international students, under the effect of the COVID 19 pandemic and the growing challenges in terms of sustainable development, education and influence in the international landscape, push us to reinvent ourselves.

Donatienne Hissard holds a Master’s degree in Modern Literature from the University of Paris-Sorbonne, a Licence degree in Chinese Language and Literature from the Inalco, and is a graduate from the Institut d’études politiques de Paris. She speaks English, Spanish and Chinese. Since 2020, she is also the president, for the second time, of the association of female staff from the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs “Women and Diplomacy”.