Justice reforms between 2000 and 2016: A process of court shrinkage to the detriment of small and medium size towns in metropolitan France

A process of public services restructuring is taking place in the French urban system. It has sometimes been qualified as “State retrenchment”. This process operates in a context where the urban system’s dynamic is both undergoing metropolization and shrinking processes. The Authors investigate the ways in which this process is organized for courts of justice from 2000 to 2016. They use the notion of ‘shrinkage’ imported from the research field on shrinking cities. Here a differentiated retraction of courts in the urban system is assumed. It is shown that small towns, cities in decline, towns that have courts of the capital of a canton and sub-prefectures are more concerned with the retraction of courts of justice. The shrinkage of the Court of Justice system is part of the more general framework of the restructuring of public services organised by the succession of reforms in public action.