Contenu du sommaire : Paris

From the Ancien Régime to the middle of the twentieth century, the central government was always wary of the political behavior of a capital city all too prone to uprisings, as illustrated by numerous episodes such as the revolt of the Maillottins, the insurrectional Commune during the French Revolution, the “Trois Glorieuses”, the uprisings of February and June 1848, the Commune of 1871, and even the insurrection for the liberation of 1944 in which the communists played an important part. That is the reason why the municipal liberties of Paris have almost constantly been restricted. It was only at the end of the twentieth century, in the context of an appeased democracy, that the law of December 31, 1975 altered the administrative structures established by the law of April 14, 1871, thereby moving the capital closer to the system of common law, albeit with some exceptions.

Confronted with the highly centralized rule of City Hall during Jacques Chirac's terms as mayor, in 1995 the left introduced a system of neighborhood councils in two districts (19th and 20th), as an experiment in consultation with and participation of the citizens. During his 2001 campaign, Bertrand Delanoë promised to generalize them, if elected, even in the absence of any legislative framework. The February 27, 2002 law made them compulsory, while also strengthening the management power of the local town halls. They have become one of the numerous new channels of dialogue with the citizens created by the new municipal team. They are highly diversified from one district to the next and they have two main goals: one is to improve municipal public management, the other is to offer local inhabitants a place for public expression and consultation with their elected representatives.

Nowadays the Paris metropolitan area is one of the five largest world metropolises in term of added value. It is the engine of French economic growth as well as the main source of transfer of revenue to the lesser developed regions. In fact, Paris combines three world capitals: one for business, one for intelligence, and one for cultural and tourist attraction. However it is now facing serious problems of development linked to a greater degree of decentralization and a trend towards increasing wage equality between French cities.

The trends toward both decentralization and globalization are making it necessary to rethink the place of the French capital in the country as a whole and the relationships between Paris and the Ile de France. There is a total lack of harmony between the unity and compactness of the central metropolitan area and the segmentation of the political authorities and competences. In order to give a new dynamism to economic competitiveness, to struggle against social exclusion and to make the city more human, it would be necessary not so much to alter the institutional map as to regroup the local authorities around a strong project likely to stir them into action.

Over the last thirty years one of the dominant features of local politics in Paris had been the undisputed political domination of the right. Its majority was so comfortable that the left seemed condemned to play a supporting role during the elections. However, from the middle of the 1990s, the weakening of the municipal right which had been in charge since 1977, together with a change in the sociological structure of the population ushered in a new political cycle. The electoral basis of the right wing parties shrank while the left succeeded in mobilizing new voters. Benefiting from the positive image it enjoys among the upper middle classes, the left managed to reverse the previous political dynamics. This trend materialized during the 2001 municipal ballot, and was reinforced by the recent regional elections of 2004.

While it had been historically submitted to the authority of central state power, since 1975 Paris has become the most powerful municipality in France. The creation of district councils has started a process of sustained decentralization reinforced by the fact that the councils are elected. As organs of the municipality, they bring its action closer to the people and guarantee the participation of the citizens, even more so since the creation of neighborhood councils. But the main problem for Paris comes from its historical separation from the suburban municipalities and from the need for an organization of the entire metropolitan area. The Paris City Hall has tried to develop a closer cooperation with the surrounding municipalities, but the collaboration that already exists between the latter makes it even more difficult to create an integrated structure around the capital. In such a context, a new coherence can only come from the regional level.

The capital cities of Europe have very diversified status and systems of government. Nevertheless they have some important common features, such as the search for new forms of leadership and responsibility for their elected mayors, the existence of districts operating as structures of participation and local administration, very close links with the central state authorities as well as a particularly complex governing structure.

The Paris civil service has a long history that still permeates its structures and mentalities and sometimes even limits its competences. Deeply rooted in the culture of the State and the service of the common good, it has gradually come to accept the fact that it could depend from the general code applied to the other territorial authorities, with some specificities due to its status as the capital city. Currently the Paris civil service is seeking for new ways to adapt itself to the increasing role played by the elected representatives, the deputies of the mayor and the district mayors, in order to fulfill the contract upon which Bertrand Delanoë and his team were elected and will be judged and, beyond that, to create a solid public service for the capital.

Jacques Chirac was elected mayor of Paris in 1977 almost by chance, but he quickly realized that he had put his hands on a treasure: 40,000 civil servants, the services of the municipality and those of the department, plus the innumerable “clients” of both. Over the recent period Paris has been not only a national capital but has also become the capital of one of the most powerful regions of Europe. The City machine is at the service of one party and one man. No doubt Bertrand Delanoë has given this a lot of thought.

The data collected in this article pertain to various domains of inquiry: sociological, economic, institutional. They always consider Paris and its inhabitants in their national and international environment in a comparative approach that highlights both differences and similarities. The various sources used illustrate little known institutional realities. The comparison of such data, rarely done previously, sheds light on the various contributions to this issue of Pouvoirs.