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Judicial Colonialism Today
The French Overseas Courts
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 October 2022
Abstract
France maintains a court system outside of the European continent in so-called overseas regions such as Martinique and New Caledonia. Held as colonies until the 1940s, these territories became part of the French state with varying degrees of autonomy. Drawing on original qualitative and archival research, this article argues that through these overseas courts, France continues to legally assume the traditional role of a colonial power despite its declared commitment to the nation-state, republican model. Subordinating discourses and elements of colonial structure have outlived the transition to nonempire, continuing to exert strong influences on the courts’ operations, especially the way in which judges and prosecutors are appointed and promoted. This study should also be read as a contribution to the scholarship on how court systems around the globe grapple with the legacy of colonialism in shaping their organizational structure and practices.
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- © 2020 by the Law and Courts Organized Section of the American Political Science Association. All rights reserved.
Footnotes
I am grateful to the research participants who agreed to take part in this study and often volunteered their time for interviews. For helpful conversations and comments on earlier drafts, I thank Christian Burset, Erin Delaney, Elizabeth Emens, Tanya Hernandez, Carolijn Kuipers, David Law, Sarah Mazouz, Sherally Munshi, Jacqueline Ross, Kristen Stilt, and Steven Wilf, as well as the participants in the 2017 International Society of Public Law conference panel The Judiciary: From Empire to Post-colonial Constructs. For research assistance, I thank Emilie Dajer-Pascal and Cécile Flahaut. For library assistance, I thank the University of Connecticut law library staff, in particular Maryanne Daly-Doran.
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