Small State, Big Society: The Involvement of Citizens in Local Government in Nineteenth-Century France

Abstract

Under the Consulate, the law of 28 Pluviose Year VIII (17 February 1800) set up a new administrative system, which was highly centralized in theory as it revolved around a strict pyramidal structure where the power lay in the hands of only one man at each level of the pyramid: the prefect at the top of the departmental administration, then sub-prefects for the arrondissements (the sub-divisions of the departements), and, at the last level, the communes, mayors.