LElectoral participation has been following a downward trend in France for several decades, which spares almost no electoral deadline. Despite its greater proximity to citizens, the local level is not immune to this phenomenon. Thus, the abstention rate in municipal elections increased from 21.1% in 1976 to 36.45% in 2014, even reaching 55.3% of citizens registered on the electoral lists in the first round of 2020, certainly marked by the Covid-19 epidemic.
What are the determinants of citizen involvement in local decision-making? If this implication is not limited to electoral participation, the determinants of voting have been studied by social science researchers. Less studied by academic literature, local voting has specific characteristics compared to national elections such as the presidential or legislative elections, particularly due to decentralization.
Recent reforms have indeed had an unexpected impact on citizens’ feeling of closeness to their local institutions. The rise in power of intercommunality, since the law of July 12, 1999, has profoundly modified the skills and budgetary resources allocated to municipalities. The development of public intermunicipal cooperation establishments (EPCI) – metropolises, urban communities, agglomeration communities and communities of communes –, which today cover the entire French territory, aimed to rationalize the offer over a wider territory. of certain public services, such as water and sanitation services, urban transport, etc.
Re-involve citizens
However, intercommunality has also contributed to depriving mayors of skills in many areas, including town planning. Most citizens have a very approximate knowledge of the prerogatives of the different local authorities. They very often attribute skills to their municipality which have become those of intercommunal authorities. This is particularly the case in urban areas, where the degree of integration between municipalities is the strongest. However, out of a little more than 140 billion euros spent by all municipalities and EPCI, around a third is today spent by intermunicipal groups.
Few citizens ultimately know who is responsible for what, what the local budgetary issues are and what they are actually voting for. Thus, intercommunality has contributed to distancing citizens from public decision-makers. Since the law of May 17, 2013, community councilors, previously appointed by municipal councils, have been elected by universal suffrage, but this law has not (yet) produced the expected benefits on electoral participation. The possible incomprehension by voters of the distinction between community and municipal councilors on the same ballot, it is necessary to add a question about the capacity of small municipalities to be fairly represented, due to the methods of distribution of seats.
You have 50% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.