Law enforcement in France

Law enforcement has a long history dating back to AD 570 when night watch systems were commonplace.

[1][clarification needed] France has two national police forces:[1]: 77 Their main tasks include the fight against drug trafficking, terrorism, gang activities, damages to property and persons, riots, illegal immigration, money laundering and road traffic offenses, maintaining public safety, securing important events, solving criminal cases, helping and rescuing victims of human-made and natural disasters and for the Gendarmerie only, the surveillance of some important infrastructures, like airports, nuclear power plants and military sites.

Many other administrations and public bodies carry out investigations and repressions of offenses, but due to the nature of their tasks, they are not regarded as law enforcement agencies.

The leadership of both agencies is centralized and they both have conventional deviance control responsibilities respectively except in different geographical locations in France.

[5] The existence of two national police forces with similar goals and attributions, but somewhat different zones of activity, has at times created friction or competition between the two.

Until 1984, the National Police were involved in prehospital rescue operations and casualty transport (called police-secours).

Many other countries have followed the French model and have established separate police agencies with the same role but different jurisdictions.

One reason for giving commission to a military force to handle matters of civilian police is that the military is not allowed to go on strike, contrary to civilian public servants such as the police personnel, which enables the government to always have an instrument of law enforcement at hand.

Another advantage of the gendarmerie is that, being career soldiers, they have the authority to use armed force in a much less restricted way than the police (in popular culture so-called licence to kill).

The gendarmes have free housing facilities inside their respective gendarmerie brigades (precincts) or live in barracks (casernes), which is not the case for the police.

[7][8] Responsibilities include:[citation needed] These actions must follow the rules given in the French code of criminal procedure, articles 12 to 29.

The rules of procedure depend on the stage of enquiry: In particular, except for crimes in flagrante delicto, law enforcement forces may not conduct searches or arrests without a specific commission from the investigative magistrate.

These prerogatives are temporarily suspended when they engage, in an organized force, in an operation of public order (i.e. riot control).