Liberté, égalité, fraternité (French) ("Liberty, Equality, Fraternity") | |||||||
| Anthem | "La Marsellaise" | ||||||
| Capital | Paris (Versailles as Royal capital) | ||||||
| Largest city | Paris | ||||||
| Other cities | Orléans, Dakar, Tours, Poitiers, Bourdeaux, Toulon, Lyon, many others | ||||||
| Language official |
French | ||||||
| others | Occitan, Breton, etc., recognised locally | ||||||
| Religion main |
Catholicism | ||||||
| others | Irreligion, Protestantism | ||||||
| Ethnic Groups main |
White | ||||||
| others | Arab, Black, many others | ||||||
| Demonym | French | ||||||
| Government | Parliamentary monarchy with a further elected head of state | ||||||
| Legislature | French Estates General | ||||||
| King | Philippe IX | ||||||
| royal house: | Orléans | ||||||
| President | Jean Louis Jospin (Socialist) | ||||||
| Population | 78,000,000 | ||||||
| Currency | French écu/franc (pegged to the ECU) | ||||||
| Time Zone | UTC-3 to UTC+5 | ||||||
| summer | UTC-2 to UTC+5 | ||||||
| Internet TLD | .fr | ||||||
| Organizations | CoE | ||||||
The French Republic (French: République française), alternatively the Kingdom of France (French: Royaume de France) is an independent republic in western Europe. With a population of 78 million inhabitants, France is the third most populated nation in Europe. France is composed of not only France proper but also its colonial remnants, most notably Continental Algeria just a few hundred km across the Mediterranean but also French Guyana, the Charter Ports of Senegal and Djibouti.
Amongst the oldest existing states in the world, France was founded by Clovis the Frank in the ninth century and has existed in different forms more or less ever since. France is one of the most important states in European history, as some of the most important historical events have either occurred on French soil or occurred thanks to French troops, amongst them the Napoleonic conquests, the Hunnic wars, the Carolingian Empire, but, most importantly, French roles in the Great War, as France was the main force (as the boulangist French State and the Drumontian Restoration) that caused the War breaking out. However, at the end of the war, I decided to help in the creation of a peaceful European framework, becoming the second founding member of the Concert of Europe together with Germany.
Today, France is a free democratic system, albeit with a complicated "pseudo-monarchic" system engineered by French national hero Laurént Enjolras that means that the state has two heads of state and two heads of government. France has got a King (currently Philippe IX, of the House of Orléans) as well as a directly elected President (Jean-Louis Jospin of the Socialist Party).
History[]
For history of France before the end of the French Quadrumvirate, see the respective articles The French State officially came to an end with the election for the Estates General of 1925, who were to act as the constitutional assembly for the French government. Led by the Quadrumvirate (Laurént Enjolras for the proletariat and the student movement, Jean Jaurés for the bourgeoisie, General Jean Baptiste Marchand for the military and Philippe, Duc d'Orléans for the monarchist movement and the aristocracy), the Estates General were the first elections France had under universal equal suffrage for all citizens over 21, and the first election the French had since the fall of the Third Republic in 1896, 29 years prior. The occasion was momentous for the French populace; it was received as the "Birth of a New France" by many.
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