Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- PART I THE POLITICAL HISTORY OF DECENTRALIZATION FROM THE FRENCH REVOLUTION TO THE PRESENT
- Introduction: When political interest leads to disinterested politics
- 1 The legislative history of recurring centralization from the French Revolution to the Third Republic
- 2 The triumph of decentralization during the Third Republic
- 3 The unsuccessful push for decentralization from the Fourth Republic through the conservative Fifth Republic
- 4 Legislating decentralization in the administration of local government: The reforms of the Socialist Fifth Republic
- 5 Legislating decentralization in the politics of local government
- PART II THE IMPACT OF DECENTRALIZATION ON LOCAL POLITICS AND ADMINISTRATION
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
3 - The unsuccessful push for decentralization from the Fourth Republic through the conservative Fifth Republic
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 May 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- PART I THE POLITICAL HISTORY OF DECENTRALIZATION FROM THE FRENCH REVOLUTION TO THE PRESENT
- Introduction: When political interest leads to disinterested politics
- 1 The legislative history of recurring centralization from the French Revolution to the Third Republic
- 2 The triumph of decentralization during the Third Republic
- 3 The unsuccessful push for decentralization from the Fourth Republic through the conservative Fifth Republic
- 4 Legislating decentralization in the administration of local government: The reforms of the Socialist Fifth Republic
- 5 Legislating decentralization in the politics of local government
- PART II THE IMPACT OF DECENTRALIZATION ON LOCAL POLITICS AND ADMINISTRATION
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The legislative history of decentralization during the Fourth Republic and the conservative Fifth Republic under Charles de Gaulle and his conservative successors was one of failed attempts at reform. Whereas in the Fourth Republic, no real reforms were passed, during the Fifth Republic, the reforms that were passed remained basically ineffective. In the meantime, the periphery had been changing. Decentralization in the beginning of the Third Republic, as we have seen, essentially enfranchised the middle-income peasants and shopkeepers at the expense of the proletariat and of the formerly all-powerful aristocracy, thereby setting the stage for a new balance of local political power. But by the Fourth and especially the Fifth Republics, France was no longer a nation of peasants and shopkeepers, even though these groups continued to hold the balance of power in the periphery. They were increasingly challenged by newer, more progressive groups made up of the salaries. These wage earners consisted of middle-level managers and workers who, living in the rapidly growing urban agglomerations that were essentially left out of the ruraldominated complicity in center-periphery relations, were intent on creating a more diverse set of local institutions and on demanding an equal share of local power. These are the groups that were turning more and more toward the Socialists and Communists, first in local elections and finally in the national elections of 1981.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Democratizing FranceThe Political and Administrative History of Decentralization, pp. 70 - 104Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1991