Electing a mayor - The French elections

Electing a mayor - The French elections

By Gabriel Sutter In France, the president is elected every 5 years by all French  citizens. There are "regions", divided into multiple" departments", and the smallest democratic  scale is the  local council.. It represents the next door democracy. The local council is the smallest administrative subdivision in France but it is also the oldest, because it succeeded to cities and parishes oduring the Middle Ages. Every local council has a mayor at its head, helped by tdeputy mayors. On January 1st, 2014 we counted 36 681 municipalities, among which 36 552 in mainland France.

             The elections (how to be a candidate, how to vote)

First, the Frenchman who wants to be the  mayor of a village or a town has various manners to be candidate. It depends on the size of the municipality. If there are more than 1000 inhabitants in the municipality, candidates group together on a list. This list is a group of people who would like to be in the local council. At the elections, the electors vote for the whole list, for the whole group.

With fewer than 1000 inhabitants, candidates sset up a list too, but elections are different : electors needn’t vote for the whole list, they can vote for individual candidates.

The number of candidates depends on the size (the number of inhabitants) of the municipality, and there has to be  gender equality in municipalities (since 2014).

To vote, a citizen has to register on an electoral list at the local City Hall before the 31^st of December preceding the elections. He must be over 18, be a French citizen and have all his civil rights . Things changed in 2014. Indeed, European citizens  could vote, provided that they were registered and of age.

 The elections (statistics ,reactions on the new changes of 2014 and new practices)

In 2014, the community councillors were composed of 60% men and 40% women. Actually, local councils with fewer than 1000 inhabitants needn’t have a gender equality. In 2008, towns  with more than 3500 inhabitants had to respect  gender equality, but in 2014 the threshold was  lowered. However, 26 878 municipalities are still not concerned. In small villages, only 35% of women were elected. According to the figures of "Insee", they were only 21 % in 1995 and 34,8 % during the last elections, in 2008. They are 40 per cent now.

Besides, municipalities collaborate very often with their neighbouring communities.They have  common duties or  interests such as  the garbage collection, the building of roads and other means of  communication.

            In 2014, the biggest defeat of the local elections was for the Socialist Party (left winged party), they lost 155 cities of 9000 inhabitants. The FN (extreme right party) won about 10 local councils and mayors. The UMP (right winged party) is the big winner of these elections, they won many seats.

The Right are credited 45,91%votes, when the Left wins 40,57% of the votes.

The FN won more councils than expected, they won  1,2% of the communities. The PS lost 16% of the communities of those gained in 2008.

             In Strasbourg, Roland Ries, the socialist candidate, was elected. In Alsace the trends are the same as on the national scale. Mainly  right winged parties  won the elections.In Alsace, right winged political parties have been the most represented for years.

             After these elections,which were a failure for the socialist party, the government was reorganized and a new Prime minister (Manuel Vals) was promoted.

Sutter Gabriel - 1S1 - Anglais - Electing a mayor - The French elections

http://www.fusac.fr/understanding-municipal-elections-france/