Patrick Le Lidec

French Top Civil Servants Within Changing Configurations: From Monopolization to Contested Places and Roles?

The top civil service under the French Fifth Republic is usually considered to be a distinctive, closed and powerful social group within the state. Many scholars underscore that the early Fifth Republic has accentuated the historical French pattern of a centralized political system with elitist institutions and an administrative system which offers both a high degree of autonomy to its administrative system and great opportunities for its top civil servants to occupy key administrative and political positions. Since the early 1980s, important shifts in the political, institutional, social and economic context have considerably modified the environment in which senior officials operate and on which their power and influence depends. National policies such as decentralization, nationalization and privatization and other changes, such as those resulting from EU membership and changes in parties in power have transformed the roles, work and conditions of top civil servants. Many have argued that the higher civil service remains unchanged and unreformed. However, this view may be misleading. The aim of this chapter is to examine the dynamics of change in the top civil service and to identify more changes, not necessarily radical breaks with the past, than are usually recognized. As a large and heterogeneous group, the higher civil service reveals and reflects some of the transformative dynamics which affect the French state.

The French politics of retrenchment (2007–2012): Institutions and blame avoidance strategies

While the semi-presidential French regime and the reinforcement of ‘presidentialization’ under Nicolas Sarkozy have often been associated with the idea of disruptive and heroic changes, France’s post-crisis budgetary policy appeared strongly embedded in the previous commitments made by President Sarkozy and relied largely on measures of a gradual and low-profile nature without significant U-turns. In order to explain this result, the article emphasizes the effects of French institutions on government capabilities and on the potential allocation of blame and the related political strategies connected with the electoral cycle and timing. In addition, it also explores the specific characteristics of the French national crisis and its perceptions by top bureaucrats, as well as the nature of the external macro-constraints that influenced French budgetary policy, whether originating with markets, international organizations or the European Union. Points for practitioners This article emphasizes the importance of institutions and political strategies in cutback management. The main argument is that budget reduction policies are embedded in political and electoral constraints that strongly affect their design and choices. The article provides many empirical elements about the specific characteristics of the French national crisis and how French governments reacted to the 2008 crisis. It puts emphasis on the specificities of French political institutions and the strong exposure to blame. The French political strategies of blame avoidance are described between 2008 and 2012, as well as the nature of the external macro-constraints that influenced French budgetary policy, whether originating with markets, international organizations or the European Union.