 The French Conseil constitutionnel and genderMathilde Cohen Chapter 23 in Elgar Companion to Female Chief Justices in Comparative Perspective, 2026, pp 491-517 from Edward Elgar Publishing Abstract: This chapter focuses on France and its specialized constitutional court, the Conseil constitutionnel, which is situated outside the regular judicial system. The chapter argues that there is little room for constitutional heroes or leaders, even less for ones who identify as women or feminists, in a country where one of the primary judicial virtues is to be depersonalized and where equal citizenship is understood in a “universalist,” gender- and race-blind vein. Historically, there have been few opportunities for women to exhibit constitutional heroism or leadership considering their exclusion from judgeships until 1946. Once they were able to access the bench, they had to contend with various structural and ideological obstacles. The chapter analyzes in particular the role of the dominant conception of citizenship that negates identity-based differences, arguing that it has both helped and hindered gender equality agendas. The French case study might thus be one of constitutional non-heroism (or anti-leadership) on gender issues. Keywords: France; Conseil constitutionnel; Universalism; Gender; Feminism; Formal equality; Discrimination (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:22158_23 Ordering information: This item can be ordered from Access Statistics for this chapter More chapters in Chapters from Edward Elgar Publishing |
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