Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Politics

Draft:History of French bureaucracy has apparently been abandoned by The Star Baron (talk · contribs). The topic is unquestionably a notable one, and this draft deserves to be developed and released. I'd like to see more citations added to it—I added a Further reading section with numerous sources that could be mined for the purpose—but it is already an advanced stub at this point, and probably releasable with some minor changes. It would be great to find someone to take this on, whip it into shape, and release it. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 03:15, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I work full-time and am a family man so I will be the first to admit I have worked on this article very slowly, but I do consider myself working on it incredibly slowly rather than abandoning it entirely. I do understand my edits have been beyond sparse at this junction, but I'm not going to claim I'm all hat no cattle. I'm a ton-of-tabs open kind of guy so I still have a few open dedicated to this topic, I just have had trouble getting my research on the cultural fame of French bureaucracy to a publishable state. Any help getting this article to the state I agree it deserves is always appreciated, and I do thank you Mathglot for taking an interest in it. Articles definitely have to be group efforts to reach their best form, but I wasn't trying to leave this article on anyone's doorstep! I do plan to be a life-long contributor to this article and to the project at large, and I will be a better contributor as I continue my education and become smarter about such things. The Star Baron (talk) 14:41, 26 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The Star Baron, great to hear from you. This is a volunteer project, and your creation of the draft is laudable. Real life takes precedence always, and when, or if you get back to it, is entirely up to you. If you do find the time, please note that the § Further reading section has a bunch of new references you can mine to flesh out the story of French bureaucracy; I left them there for that purpose, so feel free to use them if you wish, or develop your own sources. I hope other editors will see the call, and join in to help out as well. Thanks again, Mathglot (talk) 03:38, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Alerted by Mathglot: Interesting. Adjoins the administrative law topic that I have been meaning to get to for forever. I see some sentences that I would like to pull out of passive voice, but this is common and no big deal, and there is little point in polishing the English until it is fleshed out a bit more. It is true that the article feels light for the topic, which is huge, actually. I am very busy right now but would like to contribute here and there eventually. Thanks for the Further reading, Mathglot. I guess I could start by reading some of it, ans I guess let The Star Baron know which one so we don't duplicate? One partially formed thought that I can bring to the article for consideration right now is that the French Revolution brought a lot of reforms and rationalizations to rather creaky French systems including the metric system and the civil law legal system. To oversimplify quite a bit the latter brought some deceptively simple-looking principles to government, for example that laws must be written down and could not be retroactive. There was very strong feeling at the time about the whims of kings. There are a number of start-class articles out there about these fundamental principles, about which Mathglot can tell you a lot more, as Mathglot has been tending them, whereas I have been in and out in bursts doing deep dives. I did not know about Germany, but it makes a great deal of sense. A couple of Polish editors of my acquaintance once told me that Napoleon is still to this day rather popular in Poland, because he brought the civil law system to, for example, the Duchy of Warsaw. I was surprised and said he seemed like an invading mad tyrant, but ah, they said, he was nonetheless better than the sort of invading mad tyrant that they had been getting from Russia. So they were all in favor of Napoleon's invasion of Russia, which of course failed. But Poland to this day has a civil law system, a hybrid one, I believe. So there is lots of stuff that could go in a background section. There is also a more indirect link to the law and administration system of Brazil, which imported a Bonaparte to be Emperor at one point. That is what surfaces off the top of my head. Hope is is useful. If you don't get to it I probably will at some point, so... note to whomever, possibly me. Also don't forget all the French possessions and colonies in North Africa, DR Congo and Vietnam, although I am not as conversant with the details of those systems. The way that is handled the discrepancy between liberte, egalite, fraternite and the mechanics of regulating slavery and predatory colonialism are probably interesting, but the French had wheat and coral concessions in Algeria well before the French Revolution, and apparently a lot of small wars were fought over the rights to export to Marseilles. HTH Elinruby (talk) 16:31, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I have added rudimentary mention of ENA (which of course has been famously renamed during the Macron administration). I was also surprised to see that "civil service" was not mentioned in the proposed entry, so I moved the French civil service.-- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 17:37, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]