Administrative reforms of Napoleon Bonaparte: Napoleon centralised the entire system of local Government in France. The entire country was divided into Provinces, Arrondisments and Communes. The powers were vested in Prefects and Sub-Prefects who were responsible to only Napoleon. It assured that the decrees of the Central Government should promptly and uniformly be carried out. He developed and i empowered the office of the ‘Secretariat of the State’.
His major reforms were as follows.
1. Code Napoleon: The most durable of Napoleon’s work was the introduction of the a legal code which is the base for the French Law. This was known as ‘Code Napoleon’ and came into effect in 1804 A.D. He appointed two committees to draft the legal codes and the committees were presided over by Napoleon. He had a good commonsense and a legislative vision.
The 5 codes were:
1. French Civil Code
2. Code of Civil Procedure
3. Code of Criminal Procedure
4. Penal Code
5. Commercial Code
The basic demands of the Revolution like Civil equality, religious toleration, emancipation of land etc., were taken care of with these codes. He was hailed as the second Justinian.
2. Education: He introduced a national scheme of education managed by the State which was organized into four types Elementary, Secondary, Higher and Special Schools. This was to maintain uniformity of standard in Schools and Colleges. He also established the University of France.
3. Religious reforms or the Concordat: He made a code of laws for the Clergy also and to heal up the mistrust with the Papacy, entered into a religious understanding with Pope Pius-VII in 1802 known as the Concordat. He regained the sympathy of the Catholics by improving his relations with the Pope and with this treaty, Catholicism became the State religion.
4. Public works: He built new highways connecting Paris with the other major cities and improved the means of communication. Bridges and Canals were constructed. These helped in solving the unemployment problem also to a great extent. He. encouraged trade and commerce and Paris and other cities were beautified and transformed to modern cities.
5. Economy: Bank of France was established. It supervised the entire financial setup and stimulated trade and industry. Careful collection of taxes and rigid economic measures were carried out. Revenue boards were set up. The national loan was reduced and the Stock Exchanges were regulated. He took stern-measures to root out corruption and gambling.
6. Legion of honour: To honour those who had rendered meritorious Military and Civil services to the State, Napoleon started an award called ‘Legion of Honour’. It was based on principles of equality, without distinction of class and religion.
