ABSTRACT
In 1941, urban police forces were integrated in a single national organisation but the division between two separate forces was retained. Because the Ministry of Defence was primarily concerned with warfare rather than policing and the Ministry of the Interior were reluctant to finance staff from another ministry, the gendarmerie was often the poor relation when it came to finances. The equilibrium between central administration and local involvement was broken at the end of the 1980s as the hierarchy tried to reinforce its control through more rules and a more authoritarian attitude. The statistics-based management of the gendarmerie is grounded in the New Public Management theory. The gendarmerie has entered the same vicious circle that has characterised the French Police Nationale for decades: police officers work mainly for the priorities set by their superiors and spend more time controlling the population than serving it.
