Academic cooperation to meet Euro-Mediterranean challenges: the AIME project

Selected as part of AUF Western Europe's IntenSciF 2023 call for projects, the Alliance internationale des universités méditerranéennes francophones - AIME project, coordinated by Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3, came to an end this year after 18 months of intense activity.

Its ambition: to structure a sustainable scientific network between French-speaking universities in the Mediterranean basin, focusing on the region's major contemporary challenges.

Structuring a network to meet Mediterranean challenges

Driven by a shared desire to strengthen academic cooperation in the face of Euro-Mediterranean challenges, the AIME project has laid the foundations for a multilateral, interdisciplinary and innovative collaboration built around four major axes:

• ecological transition,

• citizenship,

• digital humanities,

• cultural diversity.

Objectives:

• encourage scientific exchanges between teacher-researchers and doctoral students;

• involve public, economic and civil society players in thematic discussions;

• prepare European-scale research projects;

• strengthen academic cooperation (double degrees, summer schools, etc.).

A growing regional dynamic

The AIME network has grown from nine to fourteen partner institutions in eleven countries around the Mediterranean.
In 2024, several missions to Tunisia, Morocco and Egypt helped to intensify exchanges and consolidate this momentum.
The official launch of the AIME Alliance in November 2024 marked a key milestone, with the emergence of the first strategic axes, the creation of thematic working groups and the definition of a joint scientific program.
A first joint application to a European call for projects was submitted in early 2025.

In July 2025, a workshop held at Galatasaray University (Turkey) formalized the Alliance's governance, refined its strategic orientations and planned future scientific and institutional initiatives.

Results and outlook

AIME has made it possible to build a structured framework for cooperation and collaborative governance, with a shared strategic roadmap.
The Alliance has now established itself as a space for the exchange of best practices, interdisciplinary dialogue and shared scientific production.

Its increasing openness to non-academic players (local authorities, diplomats, companies, public decision-makers) strengthens its territorial anchorage and socio-economic vocation, while promoting French-speaking research in the Euro-Mediterranean region.

Next steps

The Alliance will pursue its development by consolidating academic mobility, collaborative research and innovation, while seizing European and international funding opportunities.
Two major events will mark the year 2025:

• the "Habib Bourguiba - Memory of the Future" symposium, on November 7 and 8 in Sousse (Tunisia);

• the Alliance's first scientific symposium, on the theme "Citoyenneté(s) méditerranéenne(s)", on December 1, 2 and 3, 2025 at the Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3.