France: 125 years of freedom of association — & a shrinking civic space

As France’s Law of Associations 1901 (loi de 1901) turns 125, the country’s civic space is increasingly under attack. Laurence Lepetit, EFA vice president and chief executive at France générosités, shares how associations and foundations are fighting back, including through a new high-profile campaign to mobilise the public and highlight the importance of the sector.

The loi de 1901 turns 125 this year. When it was passed, it did something simple and radical: it gave citizens the right to organise collectively without asking the state for permission. That founding principle has held. Today, France counts around 1.5 million active associations and over 6,000 foundations and endowment funds working across every field of the public interest — healthcare, education, environmental protection, social inclusion, human rights. France accounts for nearly two in five of all associations in the European Union, an associative density 2.5 times higher than the EU average, with nearly 1.8 million employees and 13 million volunteers.

Yet in December 2025, the CIVICUS Monitor downgraded France from “Narrowed” to “Obstructed” — placing it alongside Germany and Italy, and more than 50 other countries, in the third tier of civic space. For a self-declared mature democracy, this is a signal that cannot be ignored. Since the dissolution of the National Assembly in June 2024, those of us working in and alongside civil society have felt an unmistakable acceleration: restrictions coming faster, the political climate hardening, and with a presidential election on the horizon, a shared unease about what comes next.

The funding squeeze: public and private under pressure

The most immediate pressure is financial. Several regions have engaged in systematic defunding of the associative sector. In Pays de la Loire and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, associations working in culture, social justice, feminism and environmental protection have seen their subsidies drastically reduced — sometimes with openly hostile rhetoric from elected officials. Across France, nearly 50% of regional and local authorities cut their budgets for civil society between 2024 and 2025.

The threat reached the national level too. In July 2025, a joint report by two public inspectorates proposed a sweeping reform of the tax incentives underpinning private giving. If adopted, the proposals would have reduced donations by an estimated €1.1 to €1.5 billion annually. The sector pushed back hard. The Prime Minister’s office eventually confirmed that no such measures would feature in the 2026 Finance Law. But the episode left its mark — not just as a threat averted, but as a sign that fiscal stability for civil society can no longer be taken for granted.

Legislation as a tool of control

The regulatory environment tells a similar story. The 2021 “Séparatisme law” introduced expanded powers to dissolve associations by administrative decision, creating for the first time the possibility for the state to withdraw tax-deductibility from donor-supported organisations without a court ruling. The sector opposed it formally and publicly. It passed anyway. Since then, year after year — in the 2024, 2025 and 2026 Finance Bills — amendments have targeted organisations working on environmental protection, animal welfare and migration rights, proposing to automatically suspend their tax-deductibility. In April 2026, a new Interior Ministry bill went further still, extending dissolution powers to situations where there is no direct evidence of incitement to violence.

A Senate inquiry commission launched in February 2026 added another layer of pressure. Nominally focused on the financing of public policies by private foundations, its framing conflated legitimate philanthropy with political influence — casting a shadow over the sector well beyond its stated target. France générosités appeared before the commission to defend the sector’s track record. EFA, PHILEA and ERNOP were invited to contribute a European comparative perspective on philanthropic transparency standards — a reminder that these debates extend well beyond France’s borders.

Stigmatisation and the erosion of trust

What is harder to legislate against — but no less damaging — is the language being used about civil society. Environmental organisations have been publicly called “eco-terrorists” by government figures. Associations supporting migrants have been cast as facilitators of illegal activity. In June 2025, the Planning Familial (one of France’s oldest and most respected health organisations) saw its public funding threatened, triggering a collective response in Le Monde from dozens of organisations. The Observatoire des Libertés Associatives has been documenting this pattern for years: not isolated incidents, but a sustained effort to discredit organisations that challenge the political mainstream.

For fundraisers, the consequences are practical. Donor confidence does not survive indefinitely in a climate of deliberate stigmatisation. However, in 2025, individual donations grew by 3.6%, the strongest increase since 2021. A small signal, but an encouraging one in those difficult times.

Fighting back: collective pride as strategy

In the face of dismissive rhetoric, the sector has chosen to respond with a joyful and unifying campaign that expresses our pride in a country where the voluntary sector is thriving. Associations and foundations have joined forces around a simple message: civil society is not a problem to be managed. It is democracy in action.

This convergence has produced a unified public campaign. La France qui (se) bat — “France that fights (for itself)” — launched on 4 June 2026 to mark the 125th anniversary of the loi de 1901. Our aim: to mobilise the French public, demonstrate their commitment to the voluntary sector, and remind our elected representatives and presidential candidates of the importance of protecting this sector for a vibrant democracy.

Laurence Lepetit, chief executive, France générosités