France: Presidential Leadership

Abstract

There are certain similarities between the leadership process in both Britain and France. For the most part, these similarities result from the distribution of resources between the executive branch of the central government and the other branches and levels of government. Since the creation of the current French régime, the Fifth Republic, in 1958, the country’s leadership environment has exhibited two institutional characteristics that have mirrored those of its British counterpart. In the first place, state institutions at the central level have dominated those at the subcentral level. Second, at the central level, the executive branch of government has dominated both the judicial and legislative branches. Consequently, in France, as in Britain, the system has encouraged a form of executive leadership.