The following is a guest post by Nicole Atwill, Senior Foreign Law Specialist.
My husband was recently lamenting the loss of the second of his original law partners to a judicial appointment, this time to the Supreme Court of Virginia. When I mentioned that such a scenario would be extremely rare in France, the conversation segued to the differences between the American and French systems for selecting and training judges. Below is a short overview of the French system.
The diverse methods by which judges are selected in the United States greatly contrast with the French approach where emphasis is put on judicial education before starting judicial service, and recruitment is uniform throughout the country. Potential judges and prosecutors are selected through competitive examinations that allow them to attend the Ecole Nationale de la Magistrature (ENM – National School for the Judiciary), which was created in 1958 and located in Bordeaux, a thriving city filled with historic attractions and nestled in the heart of wine country. By entering the School, the selected candidates generally start a civil service career for life. Judges and prosecutors are part of the same professional body and are collectively referred to as magistrats. As a result, they may transfer from one position to the other throughout their career.
Each year, the Ministry of Justice decides how many positions must be filled based upon the courts’ workload and budgetary considerations. It also organizes the competitive examinations. There are three entrance examinations, each for a different category of candidates. The first is open to candidates 31 years old or under at the time of the examination who have a four-year university degree or an equivalent diploma. This category attracts the largest number of candidates. The second is open to civil servants 48 years and 5 months or under who have served at least four years in civil service. The third is open to those 40 years or under with at least eight years experience in a law related field. All candidates must be French citizens. The study program and the examinations are the same. In 2009, for example, the number of positions to be filled by the three examinations respectively was 80, 19 and 6.
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