France is a republican State and a parliamentary democracy, often qualified as semi-presidential. The Parliament is bicameral and is made up of the National Assembly (Assemblée nationale) and the Senate (Sénat). The latter indirectly represents the sub-national authorities' interests to the extent that the Senate is indirectly elected by an electoral body comprising representatives of the Regions, the Departments and the Communes. A “rationalised parliamentary regime" (parlementarisme rationalisé) was established by the 1958 Constitution, in favour of the Government. However, a constitutional reform occurred in 2008 in order to rebalance the relationship between the Parliament and the Government, in favour of the former. France is characterised by a flexible separation of powers, i.e. the Government is politically responsible before the Parliament but can, in turn, dissolve the National Assembly.

France is a unitary State organised on a decentralised basis under the 1958 Constitution. France used to be a highly centralised country, with two tiers of local government (collectivités territoriales): the Departments (départements) and the Municipalities (communes). Regions (régions) came into existence in 1972 by means of law. More importantly, the so-called 'Defferre Acts' of 1982 and 1983 initiated the decentralisation process. The State's supervisory powers over the local authorities' activities were abolished. The Regions were turned into territorial authorities run by directly elected assemblies. The departmental and regional executive (conseil général et conseil régional)powers were also transferred to the presidents of their respective councils. Decentralisation was further developed with the 2003 constitutional reform by which the status of the Regions was constitutionally recognised and France became a unitary and decentralised state. The reform enshrines the local authorities' financial autonomy and authorises local referenda. In 2004, the Departments and Regions were attributed some new competences.

There are three sub-levels of governance in France: the Regions (régions), the Departments (départements) and the Municipalities (communes). They are not bestowed with legislative powers. They exercise their functions by means of regulations for some fields and through the execution of their budget.

On 16^th July 2015, the National Assembly and the Senate adopted a territorial reform law reducing the 22 regions to 13 metropolitan regions. Decision No 2014-709, “Law on the Boundaries of the Regions, Regional and Departmental Elections and Amending the Election Calendar"[1] and Law No. 2015-991"New Territorial Organization of the Republic" [2] are the legal basis for this territorial reform, taking effect from 1^st January 2016.

These reforms aimed at strengthening the capabilities of regional governmental units in France, extending regional authorities' competencies in economic development, tourism, business development and professional training

Additionally, the regions now more closely reflect a European regional unit size.

The newly defined regions are:

• Grand-Est (Alsace, Champagne-Ardenne and Lorraine)
• Nouvelle-Aquitaine (Aquitaine, Limousin and Poitou-Charentes)
• Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes (Auvergne and Rhône-Alpes)
• Bourgogne-Franche-Comté (Bourgogne and Franche-Comté)
• Occitanie (Languedoc-Roussillon and Midi-Pyrénées)
• Hauts-de-France (combining Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Picardie)
• Normandie (combining Basse-Normandie and Haute-Normandie)

In addition to the remaining original regions:

• Bretagne
• Corse
• Centre-Val de Loire
• Île-de-France
• Pays de la Loire
• Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur

Thus, since the 1^st of January 2016, there are 18 French Regions — 13 metropolitan Regions and five Overseas Regions. The 13 metropolitan Regions include the 12 mainland Regions and Corsica, while the remaining five Regions include French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Martinique, Mayotte, and Reunion. These five islands are defined as both Overseas Regions as well as Overseas Departments with their institutions. In addition to these five Overseas Departments, there are 96 mainland departments (including 2 departments in Corsica). In total, therefore, there are 101 Departments and 34 970 Municipalities. Paris, Lyon and Marseille are further divided into arrondissements.

French Guiana, Mayotte[nauza2] , and Martinique have the status of 'unique collectivity'(collectivité territoriale unique), thus uniting the departmental and regional institutions.

The overseas governments (collectivité d'outre-mer) of French Polynesia, Saint-Barthélémy, Saint-Martin, Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon (involved in Department's representation), the Islands of Wallis and Futuna, as well as the French Southern and Antarctic Territories and Clipperton have a specific autonomous status. New-Caledonia is a sui generis collectivity (collectivité sui generis d'outre-mer) ; with its own institutions and citizenship.

Martinique, Guadeloupe, French Guiana, Reunion and Saint Martin have the status of outermost regions at the EU level. Saint Barthélémy (since 1 January 2012), French Polynesia, the French Southern and Antarctic Territories, Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon, the islands of Wallis and Futuna and New Caledonia have the status of overseas countries and territories at the EU level.  

Mayotte became an overseas department of France (département d'outre-mer, DOM) on 31 March 2011 following the result of the March 2009 Mahoran status referendum, which was overwhelmingly approved by around 95% of voters. Becoming an overseas department meant Mayotte adopted France's judicial and social systems to become a full constituent territory within the French Republic. In regards to the European Union, Mayotte remained an 'overseas country and territory' (OCT) in association with the Union (as per Article 355(2) TFEU), but thereafter became an outermost region in 2014 following a directive of the European Council in December 2013.

The principle of freedom of administration by local authorities is explicitly enshrined in the Constitution, and is completed by the principle of financial autonomy of the local, intermediate and regional authorities. Local, intermediate and regional authorities (LRAs) have general competence for the exercise of their functions. As a result, shared competences are the rule. There is no hierarchy between regional, intermediate and local government.

Local authorities may carry out “local experiments". These are legal authorisations provided to a local authority in order to implement public policies that normally do not belong to its legal attributions, on an experimental basis, and on a specific territory and period of time. If the experiment is positively evaluated, the delegation of this competence to all of the authorities at the same level is tested.

Besides the Constitution of 1958, the General Code on Local Authorities (code général des collectivités territoriales) describes the competences attributed to the Regions, Departments and Municipalities. The distribution of competences among the different levels of governance is further described in numerous other laws.

Central level

The central Government is responsible for defining and implementing the nation's policy. It has the civil service and the armed forces at its disposal for that purpose, who also have local delegates.

The central Government has exclusive responsibility in all matters relating to national sovereignty (defence, foreign affairs, justice and security).

The Parliament alone has the power to pass laws and the Government makes general regulations. The management of electorate registration database has been redirected to be the responsibility of the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies at the national level. However, municipalities retain the authority to confirm new registrations, and beyond this point, the distribution of authority has not seen substantial changes between levels of government in the past two years (2016-2018).

Regional level

Both regional authorities and departmental authorities oversee the intermediate level, being specifically responsible for :

Regions

• Regional transport, including regional transport plans, civil airports, non-autonomous harbours;
• Departmental transport, including school transport, interurban transports, passenger transport, roads, commercial and fisheries ports, civil airports, non-autonomous harbours and railways;
• Education, in particular high schools (lycées);
• Vocational training and apprenticeship;
• Culture, including cultural heritage and monuments, museums, archives, artistic vocational training and learning;
• Regional planning;
• Economic development;
• Environment, and
• Scientific development.

Intermediate (Departments)

• Departmental transport, including school transport, interurban transports, passenger transport, roads, commercial and fisheries ports, civil airports, non-autonomous harbours and railways;
• Education, in particular ordinary secondary schools (collèges);
• Vocational training, in the field of music, dance and drama;
• Inclusion and social welfare (in charge of all of social aid);
• Public health, including sanitary protection, vaccination;
• Planning, including aid programme, in cooperation with the Regions;
• Economic development (complementary to that of the Region);
• Environment, in particular protection waste and water plans, and
• Rural development and agriculture aid.
• Tourism.
• Business Development.

Local level

The mayor (maire), as a representative of the State, has competence in the fields of:

• Registry;
• Electoral issues;
• Social welfare (complementary action to that of the Departments);
• Education, including primary schools and pre-school classes;
• Local roads;
• Town planning, and
• Protection of public order.

The Municipalities, as decentralised authorities, have competence in the field of:

• Municipal transport, including school transport, yacht harbours, civil airports, non-autonomous harbours;
• Culture, including teaching schools (écoles maternelles et primaires), archives, museums, libraries;
• Public health (vaccination);
• Economic development (complementary to that of the Region);
• Environment, specifically water and waste, and
• Housing.

[1] «Loi relative à la délimitation des régions, aux élections régionales et départementales et modifiant le calendrier electoral», JORF n°0014 du 17 janvier 2015 page 783, texte n° 2 (https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichJuriConst.do?idTexte=CONSTEXT000030285993)

[2] «LOI n° 2015-991 du 7 août 2015 portant nouvelle organisation territoriale de la République», JORF n°0182 du 8 août 2015 page 13705 (https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichTexte.do?cidTexte=JORFTEXT000030985460&categorieLien=id)