European Case Law Identifier (ECLI)

France

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France

National ECLI Coordinator

The Office of Legal and Administrative Information (Direction de l’information légale et administrative (DILA)) has been designated as the national ECLI coordinator for France by the General Secretariat of the Government.

Country code

The country code for France is: [FR]

Generation of national ECLI

The French supreme courts covered by the ECLI system are:

  • the Constitutional Council (le Conseil constitutionnel);
  • the Court of Cassation (la Cour de cassation);
  • the Council of State (le Conseil d'Etat).

ECLIs are made up of five components, the first two of which are constants for a Member State:

ECLI:FR:{Court_code}:{year when decision was rendered}:{ordinal number}

Each of the three courts has adopted a court code and rules for creating an ordinal number.

The year in which the decision was handed down is always made up of four numerical characters (in the format YYYY, for example 2012).

1. The Constitutional Council

The court code is always CC.

The generic form of an ECLI is therefore:

ECLI:FR:CC:{year of decision}:{ordinal number}

The ordinal number is in two parts, separated by a full stop:

  1. the serial number within each type of decision (which starts again at 1 every year);
  2. the type of decision (DC, QPC, AN… see list of types).

For example:

the ECLI for the decision of Friday 27 July 2012 No 2012-270 QPC would be ECLI:FR:CC:2012:2012.270.QPC.

2. The Court of Cassation

The court code is always CCASS.

The generic form of an ECLI is therefore:

ECLI:FR:CCASS:{year of decision}:{ordinal number}

The ordinal number is made up of two elements, written without a break:

  1. The ECLI code for the division of the court (two alphanumerical characters as laid down in the table below):
  2. AP Assemblée plénière (Full Court)
    AV Avis (Opinion)
    C1 Première chambre civile (First Civil Division)
    C2 Deuxième chambre civile (Second Civil Division)
    C3 Troisième chambre civile (Third Civil Division)
    CO Chambre commerciale (Commercial Division)
    CR Chambre criminelle (Criminal Division)
    MI Chambre mixte (Joint Bench)
    OR Ordonnance du premier président (Order of the President)
    SO Chambre sociale (Social Division)

    The code is based on the use of an internal administration number, which itself has eight characters:

    a one-character code identifying the division of the court;

    two digits for the year of the decision;

    a five-digit serial number running within that year for the division of the court in question.

    Example: the appeal number of the judgment of the Court of Cassation, Criminal Division, of 27 February 2013, is 12-81.063 and the administration number is C1300710. The first part of the ordinal number of this judgment will be CR, for the Criminal Division.

  3. The last five digits of the administration number.
  4. In our example, the second part of the ordinal number will be 00710. Altogether, the ECLI of the judgment handed down by the Criminal Division of the Court of Cassation on 27 February 2013, under the appeal number 12-81063, will be ECLI:FR:CCASS:2013:CR00710.

3. The Council of State

The Council of State uses a court code which identifies the type of division of the court: the root CE is followed without a break by a number of letters as shown below:

Assemblée (Assembly of Presiding Judges) CEASS
Ordonnance (Order) CEORD
Section du contentieux (Disputes Division) CESEC
Sous-section jugeant seule (Subdivision ruling alone) CESJS
Sous-sections réunies (Subdivisions sitting together)

CESSR

Chambre jugeant seule (Chamber ruling alone)

CECHS

Chambres réunies (Chambers sitting together)

CECHR


The code CE is not used on its own.

The generic form is therefore:

ECLI:FR:CE…:{year of the decision}:{ordinal number}

The ordinal number is also made up of two parts, separated by a full stop:

  1. the application number of the decision;
  2. the date of the delivery of the decision, in the format YYYYMMDD.

For example:

the ECLI of Council of State decision No 355099 of 1 March 2013, delivered by the third and eighth subdivisions sitting together, would be: ECLI:FR:CESSR:2013:355099.20130301

Last update: 04/08/2020

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