The president is chief of state, and is elected to five-year terms by direct, universal suffrage in a two-round system. Executive elections are considered free and fair. Incumbent Emmanuel Macron won 27.9 percent of the first-round vote in April 2022, while Marine Le Pen of the far-right National Rally (RN) won 23.2 percent. Macron was reelected after winning 58.6 percent of the second-round vote later that month. The 28 percent second-round abstention rate was the highest seen for such a contest since 1969.

The prime minister is head of government and is appointed by the president. Labor Minister Élisabeth Borne was named premier in May 2022.

Members of the lower house of Parliament, the 577-seat National Assembly, are elected to five-year terms in a two-round system. The upper house, the 348-seat Senate, is an indirectly elected body whose members serve six-year terms.

France’s electoral laws and framework are fair and implemented impartially.

Parties are generally able to organize and operate freely.

The Republican and Socialist parties dominated French politics in the early 2010s. Other parties, including far-right parties, and new alliances like Ensemble! (Together!) and the New Ecological and Social People’s Union (NUPES), which includes the Socialist Party in its coalition, have since gained more visibility and representatives.

People’s political choices are generally free from domination. However, some media outlets have drawn outsized attention to controversial political personalities, potentially skewing public perception for economic and political gain.

No laws restrict the political participation of women, LGBT+ people, and other marginalized groups. However, far-right parties and nationalist ideologies have become more mainstream and emboldened racist commentary in public discourse.

The elected head of government and national legislative representatives determine the policies of the government. However, the government has consistently used Article 49.3 of the constitution to enact legislation that is defeated in Parliament; under Article 49.3, a government can force passage of a bill and must withstand a no-confidence vote within 24 hours of employing that maneuver. The article’s use is restricted for some legislation but not for certain financial proposals; governments during the Macron presidency have used Article 49.3 on a regular basis.

In January 2023, the government proposed a pension reform bill that, if adopted, would raise the retirement age from 62 to 64, among other things. The National Assembly failed to meet the deadline for voting on the bill in February, allowing the government to send the draft legislation to the Senate without it being approved in the lower chamber. The pension reform bill passed in the Senate in March; the government then invoked Article 49.3, allowing it to bypass the National Assembly and push through the reform bill. The government survived two no-confidence votes that month. The Constitutional Court ruled that the majority of the legislation was valid in an April decision, and President Macron enacted the law the next day. The government’s controversial use of Article 49.3 of the Constitution to avoid a vote in the National Assembly was criticized by some opposition politicians as undemocratic.

A 2017 law aims to reduce conflicts of interest. Despite this, corruption cases increased by 28 percent between 2016 and 2021 according to government data. In most cases, officials have resigned or been dismissed from office.

The government generally operates with openness and transparency, though it has increasingly used Article 49.3 of the constitution to enact policy with limited debate or scrutiny.

The media generally operate freely and represent a wide range of political opinions, though journalists have faced violence in the course of their work.

Under the 2021 Global Security Law (LGS), journalists notably do not enjoy exceptions in circumstances where police officers order the dispersal of protests.

The independence of public media has been challenged by lack of funding. The elimination of the TV license fee, which funded public broadcasting, was approved by the legislature in August 2022; the French public broadcaster is set to rely on a tax-based funding mechanism to ensure that it is funded through the end of 2024. The concentration of private media ownership remains a concern.

The constitution protects freedom of religion. Antidefamation laws penalize religiously motivated abuse, and Holocaust denial is illegal. The government maintains the policy of laïcité (secularism), whereby religion and state affairs are strictly separated. However, senior officials and politicians have engaged in antisemitic and Islamophobic rhetoric in the public sphere.

The state has placed Muslim organizations under greater scrutiny. The 2021 Law Reinforcing the Republican Principles (LRPR) allows the government to dissolve religious organizations, increases the surveillance of mosques and Muslim associations, and requires the latter to sign a contract of “respect for Republican values” when applying for state subsidies.

Muslim women are subject to several laws preventing them from wearing clothing related to their religious practice or identity.

There are no formal restrictions on academic freedom in France.

Though citizens are free to express their views publicly, the government’s surveillance and tracking of individuals based on their political views has raised concerns in recent years.

Freedom of assembly is normally respected, though authorities have used excessive force when dealing with political protests in recent years.

Numerous large protests were held during 2023. Enormous protests against the government’s pension reforms were held across the country on 14 days between January and June; one such mobilization day in March saw approximately one million demonstrators take to the streets. Clashes between police and protesters during the series of protests sometimes turned violent, and hundreds of people were arrested.

In June, protests broke out after police shot and killed 17-year-old Nahel Merzouk during a traffic stop outside of Paris. The protests, which spread across the country, quickly turned violent, and saw participants set fire to property and throw firecrackers at police, who used tear gas and dispersion grenades in return; the violence had largely subsided within a week of the shooting. According to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data (ACLED) project, a nongovernmental data collection project, approximately 3,000 people were detained during the unrest. Thousands of protesters against police violence and institutionalized racism marched in rallies in July and September.

Following the October outbreak of war between Palestinian militant group Hamas and Israel, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin banned pro-Palestinian demonstrations, saying that such rallies were likely to disturb public order. Police reportedly used tear gas and water cannons to disperse protesters at pro-Palestinian rallies held in defiance of the ban. The Council of State opposed a blanket ban, stating that it is up to local authorities to temporarily ban specific protests on a case-by-case basis. French authorities began allowing pro-Palestinian protests to proceed in late October.

Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) generally operate freely. However, the LGS and LRPR have complicated and obstructed NGO reports around protests and police actions.

The LRPR eased authorities’ ability to disband associations that allegedly disrespect so-called “values of the Republic.” The law has been used to target organizations that seek to combat Islamophobia and antifascism.

In June 2023, the Interior Ministry announced that it was dissolving Earth Uprising (SLT), a radical environmental activist group, based on government allegations that the group had encouraged or provoked violence during several protests in the months leading up to the dissolution. Rights groups both in France and internationally criticized the government’s decision to outlaw SLT as disproportionate and a violation of freedom of association. France’s Council of State temporarily stayed the ban in August before ultimately lifting it in November, saying the group had not provoked violence.

Trade unions are generally free to operate without undue restrictions.

France has an independent judiciary. The rule of law generally prevails in court proceedings.

Due process generally prevails in civil and criminal matters.

The number of complaints of police violence sent to the police’s internal disciplinary body has sharply increased since 2018, as have suspicions that the body is too lenient. Since the passage of a 2017 law governing police officers’ use of firearms, police have increasingly shot and killed individuals over reported noncompliance with their instructions.

In October 2023, a man was arrested after allegedly killing a teacher and wounding at least three others in an attack officials labeled as “an act of Islamist terror.” In response, French authorities raised the terrorist threat level in France and deployed 7,000 soldiers to carry out increased security patrols within the country.

The end of 2023 was marked by an increase in violent activity by far-right groups, particularly against Muslims and immigrants. Experts warn that far-right groups’ “capacity to organize and sow discord” has increased in recent years.

Both Islamophobia and antisemitism have increased in recent years. The far-right has become increasingly successful in using racist language to shape French public discourse.

Sexual harassment of and violence against women are prominent issues.

Migrants and refugees continue to face societal discrimination and abuse from authorities. During 2023, the French government increased security force patrols along the country’s borders and escalated its drone surveillance in the Alps to prevent border crossings into French territory. An August report by international NGO Doctors Without Borders (MSF) describes French security forces’ “systematic” pushbacks of migrants attempting to cross from Italy into France, further noting that such pushbacks are “often accompanied by acts of violence, degrading or inhumane treatment, as well as arbitrary detention.” In September, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin stated that France would not take in migrants from Lampedusa, an Italian island that has seen an unsustainably high volume of migrant arrivals, mainly from Africa.

In December 2023, a strict new immigration law was passed in Parliament, reducing access to welfare benefits for immigrants and foreigners working in France, introducing migration quotas, and removing birthright citizenship for the French-born children of foreign nationals, among other things. The passage of the new immigration law was widely perceived as a victory for the far-right RN party. The bill remained awaiting approval by the Constitutional Court at year’s end.

There are normally no restrictions on freedom of travel or choice of residence or employment.

Private businesses are free to operate.

Individuals generally enjoy personal social freedoms, including choice of marriage partner and size of family. A bill enshrining the constitutional right to an abortion passed the lower house in November 2022; it remained awaiting final parliamentary approval as of year-end 2023. Fertility treatments are available for single women and lesbian couples; however, transgender individuals are not included, and surrogacy remains illegal.

During the 2020 and 2021 COVID-19 lockdowns, reports of domestic violence rose sharply, despite government measures to prevent this. Authorities implemented mechanisms to report violence and create safe zones, but their effectiveness is unclear. Domestic violence remains a key concern.

Muslim women’s freedom to control their appearance is affected by several laws. In August 2023, Minister of Education Gabriel Attal circulated new guidance categorizing abayas and qamis, clothing worn by some Muslims, as religious symbols, thereby formally disallowing the wearing of such clothing in public schools. The Council of State upheld this ban in September. Amnesty International has since called on the French government to repeal the ban, highlighting how pupils—particularly girls—have been negatively affected by the imposition of similar measures in the recent past.

Employment discrimination against women, French Muslims, immigrants of North African descent, and other marginalized groups hinders equality of opportunity. While the government acts against human trafficking, the problem persists in the commercial sex trade; some victims are also forced into domestic labor.