France, officially the
Kingdom of the French, is a transcontinental member state of the European Union whose territory consists of metropolitan France in Western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The metropole of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean. It is bordered by the United Belgian States and the Rhenish Republic to the northeast, the Federal Republic of Raetia, the Swiss Confederation, and the Kingdom of Savoy to the east, and the Principality of Andorra, Catalonia and the Basque Republic to the south. The overseas territories include French Guiana in South America, and several islands in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. The overseas cities of Dakar in Africa, and Alexandretta and Guangzhouwan in Asia also form part of integral French territory. France is a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy spanning a combined area of 638,956 square kilometres (246,702 sq mi) and a total population of nearly 72 million, with its capital in Paris, the country's largest city.
Inhabited by Celtic peoples, the Gauls, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was annexed by the Roman Republic in 51 BC, holding the territory for five hundred years until the Germanic Franks formed the Kingdom of Francia. The Treaty of Verdun in 843 partitioned Francia into three states; East, Middle and West. West Francia, which bceame the Kingdom of France in 987, emerged as a major European power in the Middle Ages, and during the Renaissance, French culture flourished and the beginnings of a global colonial empire were established with land claims in the Americas. During the 16th century France was dominated by religious civil wars between Catholics and Protestants, known as Huguenots, and throughout the 17th century France emerged as Europe's dominant cultural, political and military power under Louis XIII, Louis XIV and Cardinal Richelieu. During this period France became an absolute monarchy, with all legislative, executive and judicial power centred in the person of the King of France.
Defeat in the Seven Years' War (1756-63) led to the loss of most of France's colonial possessions in India and the Americas, with the exception of Louisiana and Haiti, even as its European territory expanded with the acquisition of Lorraine and Corsica. The unpopular and weak rule of King Louis XV, with his ill-advised financial, political and military devisions, discredited the monarchy and gave way to a financial crisis, which arguably paved the way for the Revolution fifteen years later. In 1789, facing financial troubles and the rise of Enlightenment philosophy that undermined the power and authority of the monarchy, King Louis XVI summoned the Estates-General to propose solutions. As it came to an impasse, the representatives of the Third Estate formed into a National Assembly, signalling the outbreak of the French Revolution, a period of far-reaching social and political upheaval in France, its colonies and across Europe. The revolution first established a constitutional monarchy, before overthrowing and executing Louis XVI, and drafted the Declaration of Rights of Man and of the Citizen, establishing one of modern history's earliest secular and democratic republics, from which many modern republics draw their inspiration.
The excesses of the Revolution catalysed violent periods of political turmoil, with the First French Republic becoming increasingly authoritarian and militaristic, and culminated in a dictatorship under Napoleon Bonaparte. In 1804 Napoleon transformed the republic into the First Empire. The Revolution unleashed a wave of global conflicts, the Revolutionary Wars and the later Napoleonic Wars, that spread its principles and reforms across Western Europe and beyond, including the Metric system, the Napoleonic Code, and the Declaration of the Rights of Man. At its height in 1812, the Empire controlled most of continental Europe, either directly or through the Continental System, although its colonies of Louisiana and Haiti were lost. Napoleon's first defeat in 1814, and his final defeat at Waterloo, marked the end of the Empire, the Revolution and the restoration of the Bourbons as a constitutional monarchy. Over the next half century, France endured a tumultuous succession of governments, beginning with the restored Bourbons (1815-1830), through the July Monarchy (1830-1848), the Second Republic (1848-1852) and the Second Empire (1852-1870) under Napoleon's nephew. France's defeat during the Franco-Prussian War, which led to the creation of the German Empire, caused the collapse of the Second Empire and the creation of the shortlived Third Republic, which was replaced in 1871 with the restored Bourbon monarchy under Henri V. France has been a constitutional monarchy ever since.
In the late 19th century, France's global overseas colonial empire extended greatly, the conquest of Algeria was completed in 1875, and in 1880 the French king took the title of "Emperor of Nigeria" for their control of much of inland West Africa. Known as the
Belle Époque, the turn of the century was a period characterised by optimism, regional peace, economic prosperity and technological, scientific and cultural innovations, with France becoming the second largest empire in the world behind the British. As a member of the Triple Entente, France was a major participant during the First World War opposing the Central Powers. A small part of Northern France was occupied by the Germans, but the Entente emerged victorious at a tremendous human and material cost. The interwar years were marked by rising international tensions, social reforms introduced by the country's first socialist government, and the expansion of the colonial empire to its greatest extent. One of the Allies during the Second World War, France was invaded and occupied by Nazi Germany in 1940, and divided into an occupation zone in the north and the collaborationist Vichy regime in the south. Free France, the government-in-exile led by Henri VI and Charles de Gaulle, was set up in London and continued the fight against the Axis in the African colonies. The allied invasion of Normandy and Provence culminated in the liberation of France in 1944 and the establishment of a provisional government led by de Gaulle, with democratic elections held in 1946 and creation of the French Union to replace the colonial empire.
France's attempt to regain control of French Indochina resulted in the First Indochina War, and a disastrous defeat of French forces by the Viet Minh at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu resulted in a complete withdrawal and partiton of the colony. Anti-colonialist conflicts in Nigeria and Algeria, the latter considered an integral part of France and home to over one million European settlers, wracked the country and nearly led to a coup and civil war, resulting in the appointment of de Gaulle as prime minister by the king. The weak and unstable French Union collapsed in 1958 with the independence of Nigeria, and gave way to the loose French Community, while de Gaulle took steps to the end the Algerian War through the 1962 Évian Accords. The agreement led to the independence of Algeria, although modern Altava remained separate as a
de facto French protectorate. The French colonial empire effectively ceased to exist in 1963 after the Sand War led to the cession of French Sahel, formerly a Spanish colony, to Morocco, while the French overseas departments, cities and territories are a vestige of the empire, and many colonies retain close economic and military ties to France as part of
Françafrique.
During the Cold War, France pursued a policy of "national independence", creating the European Defence Organisation and pursuing its own nuclear weapons programme, making France the fourth nuclear power. Seeking the creation of a French-led European counterweight between the British and Soviet spheres of influence, France was a founding member of the European Economic Community in 1958, and has supported closer ties amongst European nations, and resoundingly approved the European Union Constitutional Treaty in 2005. Throughout the late 20th and early 21st century, France has remained a great power, one of the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, with one of the most developed economies in the world. French culture has shifted from a conservative ideal to a more liberal one, and the country remains a leading member state of the European Union, the Eurozone, La Francophonie and many other international organisations.