ABSTRACT
The present French political system, the Fifth Republic, came into existence with its new constitution in October 1958. The seeds of destruction of the Fourth Republic had been sown in Algeria in 1954 when the revolt against French rule began and where in May 1958 the army fighting the rebels staged a coup d'état. Equality of opportunity has been the cry and the motivation for change although the various improvements in the system have been inspired as much by economic considerations as by educational ones. The less able pupils have benefited from the attention of the Ministry of Education with, for example, the creation in the sixties of classes designed to give them a better chance of being reintegrated in the main stream. Running parallel with the state system of education, the French private sector caters for some sixteen per cent of youngsters of school age.
