France and European Prison Law: Pretend Implementation and Actual Non-Compliance – An Empirical Research

Prima facie, the implementation of European prison law rules and European Court rulings seems to be facilitated by the French legal structure since it views international and European law as having primacy over national norms. However, in a written law jurisdiction such as France, jurisprudence does not benefit from a very high status and soft low is generally dismissed since it is not binding. Previous legal research has addressed European jurisdictions’ compliance with European human rights law, notably as regards prison matters. However, it has used classic legal reasoning. Few studies have put this issue to the empirical test. Two notable exceptions are Tom Daems regarding Belgium, and Koskenniemi and Lappi-Seppälä’s regarding Scandinavian jurisdictions. This article presents the results of a study pertaining to France’s compliance with the rulings of the European Human Rights Court and the recommendations of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture regarding prison issues, this by using a combination of Daems and Koskenniemi-Lappi-Seppälä classifications. It finds that, as a general rule, France is non-compliant with prisoners’ European human rights. Additionally, although it has made significant efforts to respond to the overcrowding crisis, France has failed, notably because it has not addressed overcrowding systemic and criminological causes.