COMPARATIVE GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS Series Editor: Vincent Wright
Published
Rod Hague, Martin Harrop and Shaun Breslin Comparative Government and Politics (3rd edition)
Neill Nugent The Government and Politics of the European Community (2nd edition)
Anne Stevens The Government and Politics of France
Stephen White, John Gardner, George Schopflin and Tony Saich Communist and Postcommunist Political Systems: An Introduction (3rd edition)
Forthcoming
Rudy Andeweg and Galen A. Irwin Dutch Politics
Nigel Bowles American Government and Politics
Paul Heywood The Government and Politics of Spain
Robert Leonardi Government and Politics in Italy
Douglas Webber The Government and Politics of Germany
Also published by Macmillan Education
DEVELOPMENTS IN FRENCH POLITICS
Edited by Peter A. Hall, Jack Hayward and Howard Machin
Bringing together specially commissioned chapters by leading authorities in each field, with an extensive up-to-date bibliography and guide to further reading, Developments in French Politics provides an up-to-date analysis of the changing political scene in France. Concentrating on recent developments and trends, the book provides comprehensive coverage of the political and governmental system; of economic, social, foreign and defence policies; and of key current issues and controversies.
The Governtnent and Politics of France
Anne Stevens
M MACMILLAN
© Anne Stevens 1992
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission.
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First published 1992 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world
ISBN 978-0-333-51486-3 ISBN 978-1-349-22102-8 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-22102-8
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For Helen
Contents
List of Tables, Figures, Exhibits and Maps
Priface
Acknowledgements
The regions and dipartements of France
Part I Historical and Constitutional Fra111ework
France: An Introduction 2 The Constitutional Framework
Part D The GoveJ"DJDental SysteJD
3 The Presidency 4 The Governmental Machine 5 The Administrative System in France 6 Local Government
Part m De~nocratic Politics in France
IX
Xlll
XV
XVI
3 31
59 94
118 141
7 Parliament 167 8 The Nature of Party Politics in France 194 9 Parties, Voters and Elections 222
10 The State and Civil Society: Pressure and Interest Groups 254
Vll
vm Contents
Part IV Public Policy: A Case Study
II The Shaping of Public Policy: France and the European Community
Notes
Further Reading
Bibliography
Index
285
302
310
313
321
List of Tables, Figures, Exhibits and Maps
Tables
l.l Support for the Fourth Republic 25 4.1 Party composition of selected Fifth Republic
governments llO 5.1 Public service employment in selected West European
countries 122 6.1 Local government staff on I January 1990 159 6.2 Local government revenue 162 7 .I Occupations of members of Parliament 173 9.1 Issues which influenced voting decisions in the 1988
presidential election 249 9.2 Age, sex and voting behaviour in the 1988
presidential election 251 9.3 The political balance in France 1992 253
Figures
3.1 Public confidence in President Mitterrand 92 8.1 Overlapping cleavages and the multi-party system 197 9.1 Votes and parliamentary seats taken by the Gaullists
and their allies 1958-88 224 9.2 Votes and parliamentary seats taken by the Left
1958-88 234
Exhibits
I . I The Dreyfus affair 1.2 Regimes in France since 1789
IX
12 15
X Tables, Figures, Exhibits and Maps
1.3 Prime Ministers of the Provisional Government and the Fourth Republic 24
2.1 Charles de Gaulle 1890-1970 35 2.2 Extracts from Charles de Gaulle's speech at Bayeux
16 June 1946 38 2.3 The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen
1789 41 2.4 The structure of the constitution of the Fifth Republic 43 2.5 The Economic and Social Council 44 3.1 The Presidents of the Fifth Republic 60 3.2 Presidential Powers in the Constitution of the Fifth
Republic 65 3.3 Presidential press conferences 71 3.4 The Canal case 80 3.5 Type and number of decisions of the Constitutional
Council to I January 1989 81 3.6 Referendums in the Fifth Republic 86 4.1 The Prime Ministers of the Fifth Republic 97 4.2 The French government in May 1991 108 5.1 Grands corps and grandes icoles 124 6.1 Extent of co-operation between communes 144 6.2 Mayors 145 6.3 National and local electoral systems 151 7.1 The committees of Parliament 177 7.2 The powers of Parliament 179 7.3 Use of Article 49, paragraph 3 181 7.4 Private members' bill (propositions de loi) passed 184 7.5 Electronic voting 185 8.1 Maurice Duverger's analysis of "overlapping
cleavages" 197 8.2 Electoral systems in France since 1945 200 8.3 Poujadism 209 8.4 The two-ballot system 218 8.5 The results of the presidential and parliamentary
elections 1988 9.1 Jean-Marie Le Pen 247
10.1 La vie associative 257 10.2 Trade unions in France 261 10.3 May 1968 268
Tables, Figures, Exhibits and Maps XI
Map
6.1 The dipartements of France 147
Preface
Early in the 1950s my parents tired of summer holidays mostly spent on chilly wind-swept beaches and embarked, with hire car, tents, and four young children, on what was, in the lingering climate of postwar austerity, a still unusual adventure - a tour through France. I still recall the vivid realisation, as the ferry approached Calais, that France looked different, and the even sharper shock of discovering that it really did sound different too. That journey took us from Calais to the Spanish border, and back along the Mediterranean coast. When the family turned towards the Channel again my twin sister and I stayed behind, to spend a further few weeks near Nimes, in the Ardeche and in Marseilles with the French family with whom we had been corresponding.
That summer left its mark on both my twin and me. It was for both of us the start of a continuing interest in and affection for the country and the first of many visits. For me it was a beginning that, twenty years later, led me, through many changes and chances, to the study of contemporary France. My sister came earlier to the subject, as an undergraduate in Philip Williams' lectures when the Fifth Republic was still quite young. She retains her connections with France and French people, nowadays through her chairmanship of the association that twins the Anglican cathedral of Manchester with the Roman Catholic basilica of St. Sermin in Toulouse. This book is dedicated to her.
The book is intended as a students' introduction to the study of French government and politics and also as a guide for general readers with an interest in French affairs. Teaching and research on aspects of French politics and administration have been at the centre of my working life for the past decade and a half, and I owe a great deal to the many colleagues, acquaintances and friends who make this area of study so congenial and stimulating. I should like
Xlll
x1v Priface
particularly to mention my gratitude to the Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France, to the editors of Modern and Contemporary France and to the Maison Fran~aise at Oxford for all they do to make the study of contemporary France both pleasant and fruitful. Such merits as this book may have derive largely from successive generations of students on the course The Politics of the Nation State: France which I taught at the University of Sussex. I am grateful to them and to Nicholas Wrathall of the University of Kent at Canterbury, who read the first draft. Without Liz Davis, of the University of Sussex Computer Centre, much of the text could not have moved from Brighton to Canterbury with me. Chrissy Emms saw me through my first year in Canterbury.
I have accumulated many debts over the years I have worked in this field; as I look back I am particularly conscious of those to Dr Howard Machin, Dr John Gaffney, Professor Sian Reynolds, Dr Peter Holmes, and to Dr Clive Church and Professor Fran~oise Dreyfus, who both read the whole manuscript. My family, Handley, Hilary, Lucy and Mary Stevens all believed in me and in the book even when progress seemed difficult. So did a patient and supportive publisher, Steven Kennedy. Without Vincent Wright there would have been no research, no teaching and no book at all. For the weaknesses and errors it contains I am alone responsible.
January 1992 ANNE STEVENS
Acknowledge~nents
The author and publishers wish to thank the following for permission to reproduce copyright material.
Simon & Schuster, for Exhibit 2.2. Larousse, for Figure 3.1. Methuen, for Figure 8.1. Frank Cass (West European Politics), for Exhibits 7.3 and 7.4. Longman, for Table 4.1. Economic a, for Table 7 .I. La Decouverte, for Tables 9.1, 9.2.
Every effort has been made to contact all the copyright-holders, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers will be pleased to make the necessary arrangement at the earliest opportunity.
XV
• Region prefeciUre
Regional boundaries
The regions and departements of FraDce
XVI