[4] It is headquartered in Paris and has administrative offices in Brussels, Beijing, Tokyo, Singapore, Washington, D.C., Bonn, Moscow, Tunis, Johannesburg, Santiago de Chile, Israel, and New Delhi.

The CNRS also has support units, which may, for instance, supply administrative, computing, library, or engineering services.

Following a 1983 reform, the candidates selected have the status of civil servants and are part of the public service.

Separate competitives campaigns are held in each of the forty disciplinary fields covered by the institution and organized in sections.

The same applies if a candidate has worked extensively with one of the jury members over the past two years, or has a direct and regular relationship with him or her.

Since 1954, the centre has annually awarded gold, silver, and bronze medals to French scientists and junior researchers.

The effectiveness of the recruitment, compensation, career management, and evaluation procedures of CNRS have been under scrutiny.

These modifications, which were again proposed in 2021 by think tanks such as the Institut Montaigne,[11] have been massively rejected by French scientists, leading to multiple protests.