France uses a civil legal system;[62] that is, law arises primarily from written statutes; judges are not to make law, but merely to interpret it (though the amount of judicial interpretation in certain areas makes it equivalent to case law). Basic principles of the rule of law were laid in the Napoleonic Code (which was, in turn, largely based on the royal law codified under Louis XIV). In agreement with the principles of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen law should only prohibit actions detrimental to society. As Guy Canivet, first president of the Court of Cassation, wrote about the management of prisons: Freedom is the rule, and its restriction is the exception; any restriction of Freedom must be provided for by Law and must follow the principles of necessity and proportionality. That is, Law should lay out prohibitions only if they are needed, and if the inconveniences caused by this restriction do not exceed the inconveniences that the prohibition is supposed to remedy.
The basic principles that the French Republic must respect are found in the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
rench law is divided into two principal areas: private law and public law. Private law includes, in particular, civil law and criminal law. Public law includes, in particular, administrative law and constitutional law. However, in practical terms, French law comprises three principal areas of law: civil law, criminal law and administrative law. Criminal laws can only address the future and not the past (criminal ex post facto laws are prohibited). While administrative law is often a subcategory of civil law in many countries, it is completely separated in France and each body of law is headed by a specific supreme court: ordinary courts (which handle criminal and civil litigation) are headed by the Court of Cassation and administrative courts are headed by the Council of State.
To be applicable, every law must be officially published in the Journal Officiel de la République Française.
France does not recognize religious law, nor does it recognize religious beliefs or morality as a motivation for the enactment of prohibitions. As a consequence, France has long had neither blasphemy laws nor sodomy laws (the latter being abolished in 1791). However, "offenses against public decency" (contraires aux bonnes mœurs) or disturbing public order (trouble à l'ordre public) have been used to repress public expressions of homosexuality or street prostitution. With such emphasis on public order, laws sentencing racism, sexism or antisemitism are also old and important. For instance, laws prohibiting discriminatory speech in the press are as old as 1881.[99] Some consider however that hate speech laws in France are too broad or severe and damage freedom of speech.
France's attitude towards freedom of religion is complex. Freedom of religion is guaranteed by the constitutional rights set forth in the 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. However, since the 1905 French law on the Separation of the Churches and the State, the State tries to prevent its policy-making from being influenced by religion and became suspicious in recent decades towards new religious tendencies of the French society: the Parliament has listed many religious movements as dangerous cults since 1995, and has banned wearing conspicuous religious symbols in schools since 2004. In 2010, it banned the wearing of face-covering Islamic veils in public. As some have complained that they have suffered from discrimination thus, and after criticism by human rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch,[100][101] these laws remain controversial, although they are supported by most of the population.[102]
France is tolerant of the LGBT community. Since 1999, civil unions for homosexual couples are permitted, and since May 2013, same-sex marriage and LGBT adoption are legal in France.
France is a member of the United Nations and serves as one of the permanent members of the UN Security Council with veto rights.[104] It is also a member of the G8, World Trade Organization (WTO),[105] the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC)[106] and the Indian Ocean Commission (COI).[107] It is an associate member of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS)[108] and a leading member of the International Francophone Organisation (OIF) of fifty-one fully or partly French-speaking countries.[109]
French President François Mitterrand and German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, in 1987.
Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy and United States President Barack Obama, before NATO summit, in Strasbourg, on 3 April 2009
France hosts the headquarters of the OECD,[110] UNESCO,[111] Interpol,[112] Alliance Base[113] and the International Bureau for Weights and Measures.[114] France has the second largest network of diplomatic missions in the world, second only to the USA.[115] In 1953, France received a request from the United Nations to pick a coat of arms that would represent it internationally. Thus the French emblem was adopted and is currently used on passports.[116]
Postwar French foreign policy has been largely shaped by membership of the European Union, of which it was a founding member. Since the 1960s, France has developed close ties with reunified Germany to become the most influential driving force of the EU.[117] In the 1960s, France sought to exclude the British from the European unification process,[118] seeking to build its own standing in continental Europe. However since 1904, France has maintained an "Entente cordiale" with the United Kingdom, and there has been a strengthening of links between the countries, especially on a military level.
France is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), but under President de Gaulle, it excluded itself from the joint military command to protest the special relationship between the United States and Britain and to preserve the independence of French foreign and security policies.[119] France vigorously opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq,[120][121] straining bilateral relations with the US[122][123] and the UK.[124] However, as a result of Nicolas Sarkozy's (much criticised in France by the leftists and by a part of the right)[125][126] pro-American politics, France rejoined the NATO joint military command on 4 April 2009.
In the early 1990s, the country drew considerable criticism from other nations for its underground nuclear tests in French Polynesia.[127]
France retains strong political and economic influence in its former African colonies (Françafrique)[128] and has supplied economic aid and troops for peace-keeping missions in Côte d'Ivoire and Chad.[129] Recently, after the unilateral declaration of independence of northern Mali by the Tuareg MNLA and the subsequent regional conflict with several Islamist groups including Ansar Dine and MOJWA, France and other African states intervened to help the Malian Army to retake control.
In 2009, France was the second largest (in absolute numbers) donor of development aid in the world, behind the US, and ahead of Germany, Japan and the UK.[130] This represents 0.5% of its GDP, in this regard rating France as tenth largest donor on the list.[131] The organisation managing the French help is the French Development Agency, which finances primarily humanitarian projects in sub-Saharan Africa.[132] The main goals of this help are "developing infrastructure, access to health care and education, the implementation of appropriate economic policies and the consolidation of the rule of law and democracy.
The French Armed Forces (Armées françaises) are the military and paramilitary forces of France, under the president as supreme commander. They consist of the French Army (Armée de Terre), French Navy (Marine Nationale), the French Air Force (Armée de l'Air) and the auxiliary paramilitary force, the National Gendarmerie (Gendarmerie nationale) and are among the largest armed forces in the world. While administratively a part of the French armed forces, and therefore under the purview of the Ministry of Defence, the Gendarmerie is operationally attached to the Ministry of the Interior.[citation needed]
The gendarmerie is a military police force which serves for the most part as a rural and general purpose police force. It encompasses the counter terrorist units of the Parachute Intervention Squadron of the National Gendarmerie (Escadron Parachutiste d'Intervention de la Gendarmerie Nationale) and the National Gendarmerie Intervention Group (Groupe d'Intervention de la Gendarmerie Nationale). One of the French intelligence units, the Directorate-General for External Security (Direction Générale de la Sécurité Extérieure) reports to the Ministry of Defence. The other, the Central Directorate of Interior Intelligence (Direction Centrale du Renseignement Intérieur), reports directly to the Ministry of the Interior. There has been no national conscription since 1997.[133]
France is a permanent member of the Security Council of the UN, and a recognised nuclear state since 1960. France has signed and ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT)[134] and acceeded to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. France's annual military expenditure in 2011 was US$62.5 billion, or 2.3% of its GDP making it the fifth biggest military spender in the world after the United States, China, Russia and the United Kingdom.[14]
French nuclear deterrence, (formerly known as “Force de Frappe”), relies on complete independence. The current French nuclear force consists of four Triomphant class submarines equipped with submarine-launched ballistic missiles. In addition to the submarine fleet, it is estimated that France has about 60 ASMP medium-range air-to-ground missiles with nuclear warheads,[135] of which around 50 are deployed by the Air Force using the Mirage 2000N long-range nuclear strike aircraft, while around 10 are deployed by the French Navy's Super Étendard Modernisé (SEM) attack aircraft which operate from the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle. The new Rafale F3 aircraft will gradually replace all Mirage 2000N and SEM in the nuclear strike role with the improved ASMP-A missile with a nuclear warhead.
France has major military industries with one of the largest aerospace industries in the world.[136][137] Its industries have produced such equipment as the Rafale fighter, the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier, the Exocet missile and the Leclerc tank amongst others. Despite withdrawing from the Eurofighter project, France is actively investing in European joint projects such as the Eurocopter Tiger, multipurpose frigates, the UCAV demonstrator nEUROn and the Airbus A400M. France is a major arms seller,[138][139] with most of its arsenal's designs available for the export market with the notable exception of nuclear-powered devices.
The military parade held in Paris each 14 July for France's national day is the oldest and largest regular military parade in Europe
In April and May 2012, France held a presidential election in which the winner François Hollande had opposed austerity measures, promising to eliminate France's budget deficit by 2017. The new government stated that it aimed to cancel recently enacted tax cuts and exemptions for the wealthy, raising the top tax bracket rate to 75% on incomes over a million euros, restoring the retirement age to 60 with a full pension for those who have worked 42 years, restoring 60,000 jobs recently cut from public education, regulating rent increases; and building additional public housing for the poor.
In June, Hollande's Socialist Party won a supermajority in legislative elections capable of amending the French Constitution and enabling the immediate enactment of the promised reforms. French government bond interest rates fell 30% to record lows,[141] less than 50 basis points above German government bond rates.[142]
French government debt
The French government has run a budget deficit each year since the early 1970s. In mid-2012, French government debt levels reached 1.833 billion euros.[143] This debt level was the equivalent of 91% of French GDP.[143]
Under European Union rules, member states are supposed to limit their debt to 60 percent of output or be reducing the ratio structurally towards this ceiling, and run public deficits of no more than 3.0 percent of GDP.[143]
In late 2012, credit rating agencies warned that growing French government debt levels risked France's AAA credit rating, raising the possibility of a future credit downgrade and subsequent higher borrowing costs for the French government
A member of the G8 group of leading industrialised countries, it is ranked as the world's fifth largest and Europe's second largest economy by nominal GDP;[145] with 39 of the 500 biggest companies of the world in 2010, France ranks world's 4th and Europe's 1st in the Fortune Global 500 ahead of Germany and the UK. France joined 11 other EU members to launch the euro on 1 January 1999, with euro coins and banknotes completely replacing the French franc (?) in early 2002.[146]
France derives 79% of its electricity from nuclear power, the highest percentage in the world.[147]
France has a mixed economy which combines extensive private enterprise (nearly 2.5 million companies registered)[148][149] with substantial (though declining[150]) state enterprise and government intervention (see dirigisme). The government retains considerable influence over key segments of infrastructure sectors, with majority ownership of railway, electricity, aircraft, nuclear power and telecommunications.[150] It has been gradually relaxing its control over these sectors since the early 1990s.[150]
France is part of a monetary union, the Eurozone (dark blue), and of the EU single market.
The government is slowly corporatising the state sector and selling off holdings in France Télécom, Air France, as well as the insurance, banking, and defence industries.[150] France has an important aerospace industry led by the European consortium Airbus, and has its own national spaceport, the Centre Spatial Guyanais.
According to the World Trade Organization (WTO), in 2009 France was the world's sixth-largest exporter and the fourth-largest importer of manufactured goods.[151] In 2008, France was the third-largest recipient of foreign direct investment among OECD countries at $117.9 billion, ranking behind Luxembourg (where foreign direct investment was essentially monetary transfers to banks located in that country) and the United States ($316.1 billion), but above the United Kingdom ($96.9 billion), Germany ($24.9 billion), or Japan ($24.4 billion).[152][153]
In the same year, French companies invested $220 billion outside of France, ranking France as the second most important outward direct investor in the OECD, behind the United States ($311.8 billion), and ahead of the United Kingdom ($111.4 billion), Japan ($128 billion) and Germany ($156.5 billion).[152][153] With 39 of the 500 biggest companies of the world in 2010, France ranks 4th in the Fortune Global 500, behind the USA, Japan and China, but ahead of Germany and the UK.[154]
Financial services, banking and the insurance sector are an important part of France's economy. The Paris stock exchange market (French: La Bourse de Paris) is an ancient institution, as it was created by Louis XV in 1724.[155] In 2000, the stock exchanges of Paris, Amsterdam and Bruxelles merged into Euronext.[156] In 2007, Euronext merged with the New York stock exchange to form NYSE Euronext, the world's largest stock exchange.[156] Euronext Paris, the French branch of the NYSE Euronext group is Europe's second largest stock exchange market, behind the London Stock Exchange.
French companies have maintained key positions in the Insurance and Banking industries: AXA is the world's largest insurance company, and is ranked by Fortune the ninth richest corporation by revenues. The leading French banks are BNP Paribas and the Crédit Agricole, ranking as the world's 1st and 6th largest banks in 2010[157] (determined by the amount of assets), while the Société Générale group was ranked the world's eight largest in 2008–2009.
France is the smallest emitter of carbon dioxide among the seven most industrialized countries in the world, due to its heavy investment in nuclear power.[158] As a result of large investments in nuclear technology, most of the electricity produced in the country is generated by 59 nuclear power plants (78% in 2006,[159] up from only 8% in 1973, 24% in 1980, and 75% in 1990). In this context, renewable energies (see the power cooperative Enercoop) are having difficulties taking off the ground
Thursday, September 5, 2013
François Hollande, elected President of the French Republic in April 2012.
After a short-lived governmental scheme, Napoleon Bonaparte seized control of the Republic in 1799 and was appointed by plebiscite[53] First Consul and later Emperor of the French Empire (1804–1814/1815). As a continuation of the wars sparked by the European monarchies against the French Republic, changing sets of European Coalitions declared wars on Napoleon's French Empire. His armies conquered most of continental Europe, while members of the Bonaparte family were appointed as monarchs in some of the newly established kingdoms.[54]
These victories led to the worldwide expansion of French revolutionary ideals and reforms, such as the Metric system, the Napoleonic Code or the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. After the catastrophic Russian campaign, Napoleon was finally defeated and the Bourbon monarchy restored. About a million Frenchmen died during the Napoleonic Wars.[54]
Douaumont ossuary. With 4.3 million wounded from a population of only 39.6 million at the time, the Third French Republic sustained the highest number of total casualties among the Allies during the First World War.
After his brief return from exile, Napoleon was finally defeated in 1815 at the Battle of Waterloo, the monarchy was re-established (1815–1830), with new constitutional limitations. The discredited Bourbon dynasty was overthrown by the civil uprising of 1830, which established the constitutional July Monarchy, which lasted until 1848, when the French Second Republic was proclaimed, in the wake of the 1848 European revolutions. The abolition of slavery and the male universal suffrage, both briefly enacted during the French Revolution were finally re-enacted in 1848.
In 1852, the president of the French Republic Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, Napoleon I’s nephew, was proclaimed emperor of the second Empire, as Napoleon III. He multiplied French interventions abroad, especially in Crimea, in Mexico and Italy, which resulted in the annexation of Savoy and Nice. Napoleon III was eventually unseated following defeat in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 and his regime was replaced by the Third Republic.
France had colonial possessions, in various forms, since the beginning of the 17th century to the 18th century. In the 19th and 20th centuries, its global overseas colonial empire extended greatly and culminated as the second largest in the world behind the British Empire. At its peak, between 1919 and 1939, the second French colonial empire extended over 12,347,000 square kilometres (4,767,000 sq mi) of land. Including metropolitan France, the total area of land under French sovereignty reached 12,898,000 square kilometres (4,980,000 sq mi) in the 1920s and 1930s, which is 8.6% of the world's land area.
Charles de Gaulle took an active part in all major events of the 20th century : a hero of World War I, leader of the Free French during World War II, he then became President, where he facilitated the decolonization, maintained France as a major power and overcame the May 1968 revolt.
France was a member of the Triple Entente when World War I broke out. A small part of Northern France was occupied, but France and its allies eventually emerged victorious against the Central Powers, at a tremendous human and material cost: the First World War left 1.4 million French soldiers dead, 4.29% of its population,[55] between 27 and 30% of the conscript classes of 1912-1915
The interbellum years were marked by intense international tensions an a variety of social reforms introduced by the Popular Front government (Annual leave, working time reduction, women in Government among others). France was occupied following the German Blitzkrieg campaign in World War II, with metropolitan France divided into a German occupation zone in the north and Vichy France, a newly established authoritarian regime collaborating with Germany, in the south.[57] The Allies and the French Resistance eventually emerged victorious from the Axis powers and French sovereignty was restored.
The Fourth Republic was established after World War II and saw spectacular economic growth (les Trente Glorieuses). Suffrage was extended to women in 1944. France was one of the founding members of the NATO (1949), which was the Western counterpart of the Warsaw Pact system of collective defence. France attempted to regain control of French Indochina but was defeated by the Viet Minh at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954. Only months later, France faced a new conflict in Algeria. The debate over whether or not to keep control of Algeria, then home to over one million European settlers,[58] wracked the country and nearly led to civil war.
In 1958, the weak and unstable Fourth Republic gave way to the Fifth Republic, which contained a strengthened Presidency.[59] In the latter role, Charles de Gaulle managed to keep the country together while taking steps to end the war. The Algerian War was concluded with peace negotiations in 1962 that led to Algerian independence. France granted independence progressively to its colonies, the last one being Vanuatu in 1980. A vestige of the colonial empire are the French overseas departments and territories.
In the wake of a worldwide series of protests, the May 1968 revolt, although a political failure for the protesters, had an enormous social impact. In France, it is considered to be the watershed moment when a conservative moral ideal (religion, patriotism, respect for authority) shifted towards a more liberal moral ideal.
France has been at the forefront of the European Union member states seeking to exploit the momentum of monetary union to create a more unified and capable European Union political, defence, and security apparatus
Metropolitan France is situated mostly between latitudes 41° and 51° N (Dunkirk is just north of 51°), and longitudes 6° W and 10° E, on the western edge of Europe, and thus lies within the northern temperate zone.
From southwest to northeast, France shares borders with Spain, Andorra, Monaco, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Luxembourg, and Belgium. France also borders Suriname to its west and Brazil to its east and south, by way of the overseas region of French Guiana, which is considered an integral part of the republic[61] (like Alaska and Hawaii are to the United States, or Kaliningrad is to Russia).
Corsica and the French mainland form Metropolitan France; Guadeloupe, Martinique, Réunion, and Mayotte form, with French Guiana, the overseas regions. These two integral groupings, along with several overseas collectivities and one territory, comprise the French Republic. The collectivity of Saint Martin borders Sint Maarten, a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands; however, since, Saint Martin is significantly autonomous of the French government, this is not considered an international border.
The European territory of France covers 547,030 square kilometres (211,209 sq mi),[62] having the largest area among European Union members.[17] France possesses a wide variety of landscapes, from coastal plains in the north and west to mountain ranges of the Alps in the south-east, the Massif Central in the south-central and Pyrenees in the south-west.
At 4,810.45 metres (15,782 ft)[63] above sea level, the highest point in Western Europe, Mont Blanc, is situated in the Alps on the border between France and Italy. France also has extensive river systems such as the Seine, the Loire, the Garonne, and the Rhone, which divides the Massif Central from the Alps and flows into the Mediterranean Sea at the Camargue. Corsica lies off the Mediterranean coast.
The Exclusive Economic Zone of France extends over 11,000,000 km2 (4,200,000 sq mi) of ocean across the world.[64]
France's total land area, with its overseas departments and territories (excluding Adélie Land), is 674,843 km2 (260,558 sq mi), 0.45% of the total land area on Earth. However, France possesses the second-largest Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in the world,[65] covering 11,035,000 km2 (4,260,637 sq mi), approximately 8% of the total surface of all the EEZs of the world, just behind the United States (11,351,000 km2 or 4,382,646 sq mi) and ahead of Australia (8,232,000 km2 or 3,178,393 sq mi). According to a different calculation cited by the Pew Research Center, the EEZ of France would be 10,084,201 km2 (3,893,532 sq mi), still behind the United States (12,174,629 km2 or 4,700,651 sq mi), and still ahead of Australia (8,980,568 km2 or 3,467,417 sq mi) and Russia (7,566,673 km2 or 2,921,509 sq mi)
France was one of the first countries to create a Ministry of the Environment, in 1971.[67] Although France is one of the most industrialised and developed countries, it is ranked only seventeenth by carbon dioxide emissions, behind such less populous nations as Canada, Saudi Arabia or Australia. This situation results from the French government's decision to invest in nuclear power in 1974 (after the 1973 oil crisis[68]), which now accounts for 78% of France's electricity production[69] and explains why France pollutes less than comparable countries.[70][71]
Like all European Union members, France agreed to cut carbon emissions by at least 20% of 1990 levels by the year 2020,[72] in comparison the USA agreed to a cut of 4% of its emissions[73] whereas China stated it wanted to "reduce its carbon intensity by 40–45% by the year 2020" (compared with 2005 levels),[74] which means with a GDP growth of 8% yearly an augmentation of 80%[73] to 250%[75] of the Chinese carbon emissions by 2020.
In 2009, the French carbon dioxide emissions per capita level is lower than the Chinese one.[76]
France was even set to impose a carbon tax in 2009 at 17 Euros per tonne of carbon dioxide emitted.[77] The carbon tax would have brought in 4.3 billion Euros of revenue per year.[78] However, 6 months later, the plan for a carbon tax was abandoned for various reasons, one being that French companies would have a more difficult time competing with companies in neighboring countries who would not have to pay such steep taxes on carbon dioxide emissions. Instituting a carbon tax was also an unpopular political move for President Sarkozy.[79]
In 2010, a study at Yale and Columbia universities ranked France the 7th most environmentally conscious country in the world.[80][81]
Forests account for 28% of the land area of France.[82][83] French forests are also some of the most diversified of Europe, with more than 140 differents varieties of trees.[84] There are 9 national parks[85] and 46 natural parks in France.[86] France wants to convert 20% of its Exclusive Economic Zone in a Marine Protected Area by 2020
The French Republic is a unitary semi-presidential republic with strong democratic traditions.[91] The constitution of the Fifth Republic was approved by referendum on 28 September 1958.[92] It greatly strengthened the authority of the executive in relation to parliament. The executive branch itself has two leaders: the President of the Republic, currently François Hollande, who is head of state and is elected directly by universal adult suffrage for a 5-year term (formerly 7 years),[93] and the Government, led by the president-appointed Prime Minister, currently Jean-Marc Ayrault.
François Hollande, elected President of the French Republic in April 2012.
The French parliament is a bicameral legislature comprising a National Assembly (Assemblée Nationale) and a Senate.[94] The National Assembly deputies represent local constituencies and are directly elected for 5-year terms.[95] The Assembly has the power to dismiss the cabinet, and thus the majority in the Assembly determines the choice of government. Senators are chosen by an electoral college for 6-year terms (originally 9-year terms), and one half of the seats are submitted to election every 3 years starting in September 2008.[96]
The Senate's legislative powers are limited; in the event of disagreement between the two chambers, the National Assembly has the final say.[97] The government has a strong influence in shaping the agenda of Parliament.
French politics are characterised by two politically opposed groupings: one left-wing, centred around the French Socialist Party, and the other right-wing, centred previously around the Rassemblement pour la République (RPR) and now its successor the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP).[98] Since the 2012 elections, the executive branch is currently composed mostly of the Socialist Party
These victories led to the worldwide expansion of French revolutionary ideals and reforms, such as the Metric system, the Napoleonic Code or the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. After the catastrophic Russian campaign, Napoleon was finally defeated and the Bourbon monarchy restored. About a million Frenchmen died during the Napoleonic Wars.[54]
Douaumont ossuary. With 4.3 million wounded from a population of only 39.6 million at the time, the Third French Republic sustained the highest number of total casualties among the Allies during the First World War.
After his brief return from exile, Napoleon was finally defeated in 1815 at the Battle of Waterloo, the monarchy was re-established (1815–1830), with new constitutional limitations. The discredited Bourbon dynasty was overthrown by the civil uprising of 1830, which established the constitutional July Monarchy, which lasted until 1848, when the French Second Republic was proclaimed, in the wake of the 1848 European revolutions. The abolition of slavery and the male universal suffrage, both briefly enacted during the French Revolution were finally re-enacted in 1848.
In 1852, the president of the French Republic Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte, Napoleon I’s nephew, was proclaimed emperor of the second Empire, as Napoleon III. He multiplied French interventions abroad, especially in Crimea, in Mexico and Italy, which resulted in the annexation of Savoy and Nice. Napoleon III was eventually unseated following defeat in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 and his regime was replaced by the Third Republic.
France had colonial possessions, in various forms, since the beginning of the 17th century to the 18th century. In the 19th and 20th centuries, its global overseas colonial empire extended greatly and culminated as the second largest in the world behind the British Empire. At its peak, between 1919 and 1939, the second French colonial empire extended over 12,347,000 square kilometres (4,767,000 sq mi) of land. Including metropolitan France, the total area of land under French sovereignty reached 12,898,000 square kilometres (4,980,000 sq mi) in the 1920s and 1930s, which is 8.6% of the world's land area.
Charles de Gaulle took an active part in all major events of the 20th century : a hero of World War I, leader of the Free French during World War II, he then became President, where he facilitated the decolonization, maintained France as a major power and overcame the May 1968 revolt.
France was a member of the Triple Entente when World War I broke out. A small part of Northern France was occupied, but France and its allies eventually emerged victorious against the Central Powers, at a tremendous human and material cost: the First World War left 1.4 million French soldiers dead, 4.29% of its population,[55] between 27 and 30% of the conscript classes of 1912-1915
The interbellum years were marked by intense international tensions an a variety of social reforms introduced by the Popular Front government (Annual leave, working time reduction, women in Government among others). France was occupied following the German Blitzkrieg campaign in World War II, with metropolitan France divided into a German occupation zone in the north and Vichy France, a newly established authoritarian regime collaborating with Germany, in the south.[57] The Allies and the French Resistance eventually emerged victorious from the Axis powers and French sovereignty was restored.
The Fourth Republic was established after World War II and saw spectacular economic growth (les Trente Glorieuses). Suffrage was extended to women in 1944. France was one of the founding members of the NATO (1949), which was the Western counterpart of the Warsaw Pact system of collective defence. France attempted to regain control of French Indochina but was defeated by the Viet Minh at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954. Only months later, France faced a new conflict in Algeria. The debate over whether or not to keep control of Algeria, then home to over one million European settlers,[58] wracked the country and nearly led to civil war.
In 1958, the weak and unstable Fourth Republic gave way to the Fifth Republic, which contained a strengthened Presidency.[59] In the latter role, Charles de Gaulle managed to keep the country together while taking steps to end the war. The Algerian War was concluded with peace negotiations in 1962 that led to Algerian independence. France granted independence progressively to its colonies, the last one being Vanuatu in 1980. A vestige of the colonial empire are the French overseas departments and territories.
In the wake of a worldwide series of protests, the May 1968 revolt, although a political failure for the protesters, had an enormous social impact. In France, it is considered to be the watershed moment when a conservative moral ideal (religion, patriotism, respect for authority) shifted towards a more liberal moral ideal.
France has been at the forefront of the European Union member states seeking to exploit the momentum of monetary union to create a more unified and capable European Union political, defence, and security apparatus
Metropolitan France is situated mostly between latitudes 41° and 51° N (Dunkirk is just north of 51°), and longitudes 6° W and 10° E, on the western edge of Europe, and thus lies within the northern temperate zone.
From southwest to northeast, France shares borders with Spain, Andorra, Monaco, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Luxembourg, and Belgium. France also borders Suriname to its west and Brazil to its east and south, by way of the overseas region of French Guiana, which is considered an integral part of the republic[61] (like Alaska and Hawaii are to the United States, or Kaliningrad is to Russia).
Corsica and the French mainland form Metropolitan France; Guadeloupe, Martinique, Réunion, and Mayotte form, with French Guiana, the overseas regions. These two integral groupings, along with several overseas collectivities and one territory, comprise the French Republic. The collectivity of Saint Martin borders Sint Maarten, a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands; however, since, Saint Martin is significantly autonomous of the French government, this is not considered an international border.
The European territory of France covers 547,030 square kilometres (211,209 sq mi),[62] having the largest area among European Union members.[17] France possesses a wide variety of landscapes, from coastal plains in the north and west to mountain ranges of the Alps in the south-east, the Massif Central in the south-central and Pyrenees in the south-west.
At 4,810.45 metres (15,782 ft)[63] above sea level, the highest point in Western Europe, Mont Blanc, is situated in the Alps on the border between France and Italy. France also has extensive river systems such as the Seine, the Loire, the Garonne, and the Rhone, which divides the Massif Central from the Alps and flows into the Mediterranean Sea at the Camargue. Corsica lies off the Mediterranean coast.
The Exclusive Economic Zone of France extends over 11,000,000 km2 (4,200,000 sq mi) of ocean across the world.[64]
France's total land area, with its overseas departments and territories (excluding Adélie Land), is 674,843 km2 (260,558 sq mi), 0.45% of the total land area on Earth. However, France possesses the second-largest Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) in the world,[65] covering 11,035,000 km2 (4,260,637 sq mi), approximately 8% of the total surface of all the EEZs of the world, just behind the United States (11,351,000 km2 or 4,382,646 sq mi) and ahead of Australia (8,232,000 km2 or 3,178,393 sq mi). According to a different calculation cited by the Pew Research Center, the EEZ of France would be 10,084,201 km2 (3,893,532 sq mi), still behind the United States (12,174,629 km2 or 4,700,651 sq mi), and still ahead of Australia (8,980,568 km2 or 3,467,417 sq mi) and Russia (7,566,673 km2 or 2,921,509 sq mi)
France was one of the first countries to create a Ministry of the Environment, in 1971.[67] Although France is one of the most industrialised and developed countries, it is ranked only seventeenth by carbon dioxide emissions, behind such less populous nations as Canada, Saudi Arabia or Australia. This situation results from the French government's decision to invest in nuclear power in 1974 (after the 1973 oil crisis[68]), which now accounts for 78% of France's electricity production[69] and explains why France pollutes less than comparable countries.[70][71]
Like all European Union members, France agreed to cut carbon emissions by at least 20% of 1990 levels by the year 2020,[72] in comparison the USA agreed to a cut of 4% of its emissions[73] whereas China stated it wanted to "reduce its carbon intensity by 40–45% by the year 2020" (compared with 2005 levels),[74] which means with a GDP growth of 8% yearly an augmentation of 80%[73] to 250%[75] of the Chinese carbon emissions by 2020.
In 2009, the French carbon dioxide emissions per capita level is lower than the Chinese one.[76]
France was even set to impose a carbon tax in 2009 at 17 Euros per tonne of carbon dioxide emitted.[77] The carbon tax would have brought in 4.3 billion Euros of revenue per year.[78] However, 6 months later, the plan for a carbon tax was abandoned for various reasons, one being that French companies would have a more difficult time competing with companies in neighboring countries who would not have to pay such steep taxes on carbon dioxide emissions. Instituting a carbon tax was also an unpopular political move for President Sarkozy.[79]
In 2010, a study at Yale and Columbia universities ranked France the 7th most environmentally conscious country in the world.[80][81]
Forests account for 28% of the land area of France.[82][83] French forests are also some of the most diversified of Europe, with more than 140 differents varieties of trees.[84] There are 9 national parks[85] and 46 natural parks in France.[86] France wants to convert 20% of its Exclusive Economic Zone in a Marine Protected Area by 2020
The French Republic is a unitary semi-presidential republic with strong democratic traditions.[91] The constitution of the Fifth Republic was approved by referendum on 28 September 1958.[92] It greatly strengthened the authority of the executive in relation to parliament. The executive branch itself has two leaders: the President of the Republic, currently François Hollande, who is head of state and is elected directly by universal adult suffrage for a 5-year term (formerly 7 years),[93] and the Government, led by the president-appointed Prime Minister, currently Jean-Marc Ayrault.
François Hollande, elected President of the French Republic in April 2012.
The French parliament is a bicameral legislature comprising a National Assembly (Assemblée Nationale) and a Senate.[94] The National Assembly deputies represent local constituencies and are directly elected for 5-year terms.[95] The Assembly has the power to dismiss the cabinet, and thus the majority in the Assembly determines the choice of government. Senators are chosen by an electoral college for 6-year terms (originally 9-year terms), and one half of the seats are submitted to election every 3 years starting in September 2008.[96]
The Senate's legislative powers are limited; in the event of disagreement between the two chambers, the National Assembly has the final say.[97] The government has a strong influence in shaping the agenda of Parliament.
French politics are characterised by two politically opposed groupings: one left-wing, centred around the French Socialist Party, and the other right-wing, centred previously around the Rassemblement pour la République (RPR) and now its successor the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP).[98] Since the 2012 elections, the executive branch is currently composed mostly of the Socialist Party
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)