Prefects, Governors and Commissioners: Territorial Representatives of the State in Europe

“Tanguy and Eymeri-Douzans have assembled a timely collection of papers on prefects and their equivalents in Europe. This book fills a gap in the literature, demonstrating that even countries favouring decentralization also have forms of control from the centre. It is even more interesting by its anchoring in administrative history and the patterns of diffusion of the prefectoral role.” – B. Guy Peters, University of Pittsburgh
“Eymeri-Douzans and Tanguy’s book on regional governors in Europe will be the standard reference in its field. Offering many country chapters and comparative assessments, it is a valuable source to anyone interested in regional governance.” – Jon Pierre, University of Gothenburg

“This book is a must for anyone interested in meso-level governance. It breaks new ground by focusing less on networks and more on a particular figure: the territorial representative of the State. Sometimes under-researched, such State delegates can be found in most countries within and beyond Europe. This is a fine comparative study that fills an important void.” – Alistair Cole, Hong Kong Baptist University

Is the Prefect an exception, surviving only in France and some countries influenced by Napoleon? No! This book tells the varied stories of the resilience, in most European States and under different names, of the prefectoral institution. It is the first comparative book in English studying these territorial administrators who have a go-between role in centre-periphery relations and a nodal role in territorial governance. Gathering a multidisciplinary team of scholars under the auspices of the European Group for Public Administration, this volume offers a fine-grained analysis of 17 national cases, examines cross-country data, and proposes a theoretical frame made of a Weberian ideal-type with three variants, to better comprehend and explain the permanence and changes of the prefectoral figure.

Gildas Tanguy is Associate Professor at Sciences Po Toulouse and deputy-director of the Laboratory of the Social Sciences of the Polity (LaSSP).

Jean-Michel Eymeri-Douzans is the President of the European Group for Public Administration (EGPA), and a Professor at Sciences Po Toulouse-LaSSP.