The Gendarmerie Alternative: Is There a Case for the Existence of Police Organisations with Military Status in the Twenty-First Century European Security Apparatus?
| Author | Pierre Gobinet |
| Published date | 01 December 2008 |
| Date | 01 December 2008 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1350/ijps.2008.10.4.098 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
The gendarmerie alternative: is there a
case for the existence of police
organisations with military status in the
twenty-first century European security
apparatus?
Pierre Gobinet
Euro-Divers Egypt, PO Box 48, El Gouna - Red Sea, 84513 Egypt. Email:
gobinetp@hotmail.com
Received 11 August 2007; accepted 13 September 2007
Keywords: gendarmerie, military police, paramilitary, militarisation, peace-
keeping, public order
Editor’s note: This article is a much shortened
version of a master’s level dissertation submitted
as part of the course requirements for the Uni-
versity of Portsmouth’s (UK) postgraduate
degree in International Criminal Justice. The
dissertation was selected as the 2007 winner of
the Vathek Postgraduate Dissertation Prize.
Pierre Gobinet
was born in Limoges, France. He
lived in Syracuse, NY, from 1986 to 1990, and
graduated from Saint-Cyr, the French Army
Officer Academy, in 1999. He then chose to
serve in the gendarmerie and spent a year at the
institution’s Officer Academy in Melun, near
Paris. He was subsequently assigned as platoon
leader in a riot control squadron in Rouen,
Normandy for three years. He served on several
public order assignments in Corsica and New
Caledonia, and spent seven months in Kosovo
working for KFOR as Deputy Operations Officer
for the MSU (Multinational Specialised Unit) regi-
ment in Pristina. In 2003 he was assigned as
French liaison Officer to Europol in The Hague,
the Netherlands, and concurrently signed up for
the MSc International Police Science degree
course at Portsmouth University. He returned to
France in 2006 as the head of the gendarmerie
force in Dunkerque. He recently left active ser-
vice and is now part of the gendarmerie’s reserve
staff.
A
BSTRACT
Historical literature traditionally assimilates gen-
darmerie forces with old-fashioned, centralised,
colonial, or totalitarian regimes. Similarly, the
media and much of the current academic literature
seem to consider the gendarmerie model as anti-
quated, and unable to meet the demands of public
accountability or human rights compliance asso-
ciated with modern democratic policing. How
then can France, Italy or the Netherlands still
reasonably promote it as a credible policing altern-
ative? Gendarmeries receive very little attention
from the Anglo-American criminal justice com-
munity. On closer inspection however, it appears
that gendarmeries are tasked to perform public
order, riot control and cr iminal police duties in
many European democracies. This unique asso-
ciation of military semantics and civilian police
tasks symbolises the modern gendarmerie concept,
which can provide a substantial added value with
public, specialised and professional police units.
This critical analysis of the existing literature
International Journal of Police
Science and Management,
Vol. 10 No. 4, 2008, pp. 448–463.
DOI: 10.1350/ijps.2008.10.4.098
International Journal of Police Science & Management Volume 10 Number 4
Page 448
examines how gendarmeries are viewed by the
English-speaking academic community, and most
importantly, why this perception has become
flawed. One of the lead arguments is that the
terminology habitually used to describe the gen-
darmerie model, because it wrongly suggests a
persistent functional discrepancy between these
forces and their civilian counterparts found for
instance in common-law countries, actually con-
ceals the fact that gendarmeries have become
important actors on the European policing scene.
The study singles out arguments which demon-
strate that police forces bearing a military status
present useful credentials to promote the liberal-
democratic policing ideal in twenty-first century
Europe.
INTRODUCTION
‘Lex pacificerat’ (‘May the law pacify’)
This study was initiated in the wake of the
official inauguration of the European
Gendarmerie Force (EGF) by France, Italy,
Portugal, the Netherlands and Spain, in
Vicenza, Italy, in January 2006 (Morin,
2006). One of the few English language
articles to have commented on this event
was that of Statewatch editor, Tony Bunyan,
who wrote:
The creation of a European para-military
force, the EGF, adds to the growing list
of bodies, agencies and forces spawned
by the EU over which there is scant
accountability, scrutiny, transparency or
openness. Para-military police are by
their very name and nature trained to use
force beyond that normally available to
police forces and require greater not less
oversight. (Statewatch, 2006)
However, if five western European demo-
cracies openly promoted the gendarmerie
model on their security agenda in 2006, can
it still be reduced to a paramilitary aberra-
tion? In light of these recent developments,
it appears necessary to examine critically
how gendarmeries are viewed by the
English-speaking academic community, and
why this perception has become flawed.
The first aim is to examine cr itically the
perception of gendarmerie forces in the
literature and to consider the impact of
historical legacy on the modern structures
and practices of gendarmeries by using the
example of their ancestor, the French
Maréchaussée. This brief histor ical over-
view outlines the basic concepts of the
gendarmerie model and is followed by a
critical review of the terminology currently
used to describe gendarmer ie forces in the
academic field.
The second aim of this study is to assess
the relevance of gendarmeries in the
twenty-first century European security
apparatus. Arguments are categorised within
two opposing hypotheses. The first hypo-
thesis is that all gendarmeries are inevitably
destined to be demilitarised and integrated
with civilian police structures. This is sup-
ported by factors such as the growing
urbanisation, privatisation and homogenisa-
tion of European police services, and by
recent historical precedents in countries
that have recently demilitarised their gen-
darmerie. To balance these arguments, this
study looked at a series of functional factors
which support an opposing hypothesis,
according to which gendarmeries remain a
viable and efficient solution to deal with
contemporary crime and secur ity issues.
This study ends with a critical examina-
tion of the controversial relationship the
literature establishes between gendarmeries
and democratic policing. The final discus-
sion section thus argues that the specificity
of the gendarmeries’ militar y status is
not inherently incompatible with police
accountability.
Gobinet
Page 449
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