France

J

Communications

The French postal, telegraph, and telephone systems are state-owned, although the telephone and post systems are under autonomous management. Around 587 telephones per 1,000 people were in use in 2005. Radio and television services are conducted by independent, publicly financed organizations, as well as by private commercial operators. Three state-run television channels were in operation in the mid-1990s, along with satellite and cable services. About 55 million radios and some 37 million television sets were in use in 2000.

France has 117 daily newspapers, with a total circulation of about 2.5 million (1996). Sales of national dailies have fallen dramatically throughout the 1980s and 1990s. The most influential newspapers are published in Paris. These include Le Monde (circulation 307,000), Le Figaro (380,000), France-Soir (200,000), and Le Parisien (431,000). The country’s leading periodicals include Paris-Match (circulation 690,000), L’Express (544,750), Le Canard Enchaîné (520,000), and Le Nouvel Observateur (324,200).

V

Government

The governmental system of France is a presidential republic, based on the constitution that was promulgated in October 1958. This document reduces the power of parliament to overthrow Cabinets and markedly enlarges the authority of the president. It vests the sovereignty of the republic in the French people, who can exercise their political power through a representative parliament as well as through referenda. The French parliament consists of the National Assembly (577 deputies) and the Senate (326 members). The former body is elected by direct universal suffrage, with each party’s representation proportionate to its showing in the popular vote: deputies serve terms of up to five years. Senators are elected to six-year terms by indirect popular suffrage—that is, by the membership of other representative bodies. The constitution of 1958 established a new body, the Constitutional Council, which has general power to supervise elections and referenda and to decide constitutional questions; the council consists of nine appointed members and all former presidents of the republic. France has a voting age of 18.

A

Executive and Legislature

The president was formerly elected for a seven-year term by direct popular vote but, as the result of a referendum of September 2000, the term of office has been cut to five years. (The president was chosen by an electoral college of governmental bodies until 1962, when a constitutional amendment changed the method.) The president is commander of the armed forces and presides over the High Council of the Judiciary, the Committee of National Defence, and the Council of Ministers (Cabinet). The president designates the prime minister (premier) and appoints Cabinet ministers.

The prime minister and the Council of Ministers are responsible only to the National Assembly, although the premier has the right to ask the Senate for approval of a general declaration of policy. When the National Assembly adopts a motion of censure, or when it rejects the programme or a declaration of general policy of the Cabinet, the premier must resign.

The French parliament consists of two chambers with supreme legislative authority vested in the National Assembly. The Senate is an advisory body with the right to examine and render opinions on legislation and policies initiated in the National Assembly and to delay, but not prevent, the passage of legislation. If the two chambers disagree on a bill, final decision rests with the National Assembly, which may either accept the Senate’s version or, after a specified period, readopt its own. Acting in an advisory capacity on economic matters to the National Assembly and the Council of Ministers is the Economic and Social Council, consisting of representatives from groups of workers and employers, and from professional and cultural organizations. The Constitution of 1958 limits the National Assembly to two regular sessions annually, totalling five and one-half months, permits the adoption of votes of censure against the government by an absolute majority only (instead of a majority of those voting, as previously), and forbids sponsors of an unadopted motion of censure to introduce another such motion during the same session. Constitutional amendments may be adopted after approval by both chambers of the parliament and by a subsequent popular referendum, or merely by approval of three fifths of the parliament.

B

Political Parties

France has often had numerous political groups, many of which differ from one another on only minor points of theory or policy. The legislative requirements of the Fifth Republic, however, have tended to force the merger or coalition of independent political parties. Four major groups—two centre-right organizations and two leftist parties—dominated French politics in the 1980s and early 1990s. The Rassemblement pour la République (Rally for the Republic), or RPR, founded in 1976 by Jacques Chirac, claimed affinity with the ideas of the former President Charles de Gaulle. The Union for French Democracy (UDF), a coalition built around the Republican Party, was closely tied to the former President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing. On the left were the Socialist Party, led by French President François Mitterrand, and the French Communist Party, headed by Georges Marchais. In the 1993 parliamentary elections a coalition of the RPR and UDF drove the Socialists from power by winning more than 80 per cent of the seats in the National Assembly. With Mitterrand determined to remain in office until the presidential elections of 1995, France entered a period of “cohabitation” government. This first period of cohabitation came to an end with the election of Jacques Chirac as President in 1995, but the left and right parties were forced into another period of cohabitation after the Socialist Party, in alliance with the Communist and Green parties, won the parliamentary elections of June 1997. The success of the far-right candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen in reaching the second round of the 2002 presidential election renewed concern about the extent of support for his National Front party, though it failed to win any seats in the subsequent June parliamentary elections. Since 2002 the major party of the right in France has been the UMP (Union pour un Mouvement Populaire), which was originally founded to support the policies of President Chirac (it incorporated the PRP as well as liberal democrats and Christian democrats). In 2004 Nicolas Sarkozy became leader of the UMP.

C

Judiciary

Justice is administered in France in petty criminal and civil cases by local courts called Tribunals of Instance and Tribunals of Great Instance. Crimes punishable by prison terms of five years or less and major civil cases are tried in correctional courts. Appeals from all of these lower courts are heard by courts of appeal. Major criminal cases are tried before the courts of assizes. Appeals from decisions of the courts of assizes and the courts of appeal may be reviewed by the court of cassation, which is empowered to annul judgments and order new trials.