France,[IX] officially the French Republic,[X] is a country located primarily in Western
Europe. Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South
America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the North Atlantic, the French West Indies,
and many islands in Oceania and the Indian Ocean, giving it one of the largest
discontiguous exclusive economic zones in the world. Metropolitan France shares
borders with Belgium and Luxembourg to the north, Germany to the
northeast, Switzerland to the east, Italy and Monaco to the
southeast, Andorra and Spain to the south, and a maritime border with the United
Kingdom to the northwest. Its metropolitan area extends from the Rhine to the Atlantic
Ocean and from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea.
Its eighteen integral regions—five of which are overseas—span a combined area of
643,801 km2 (248,573 sq mi) and have a total population of nearly 68.4 million as of
January 2024. France is a semi-presidential republic with its capital in Paris,
the country's largest city and main cultural and economic centre.
Metropolitan France was settled during the Iron Age by Celtic tribes known
as Gauls before Rome annexed the area in 51 BC, leading to a distinct Gallo-Roman
culture. In the Early Middle Ages, the Franks formed the kingdom of Francia, which
became the heartland of the Carolingian Empire. The Treaty of Verdun of 843
partitioned the empire, with West Francia evolving into the Kingdom of France. In
the High Middle Ages, France was a powerful but decentralized feudal kingdom, but
from the mid-14th to the mid-15th centuries, France was plunged into a dynastic conflict
with England known as the Hundred Years' War. In the 16th century, French
culture flourished during the French Renaissance and a French colonial
empire emerged. Internally, France was dominated by the conflict with the House of
Habsburg and the French Wars of Religion between Catholics and Huguenots. France
was successful in the Thirty Years' War and further increased its influence during the
reign of Louis XIV.
The French Revolution of 1789 overthrew the Ancien Régime and produced
the Declaration of the Rights of Man, which expresses the nation's ideals to this day.
France reached its political and military zenith in the early 19th century under Napoleon
Bonaparte, subjugating part of continental Europe and establishing the First French
Empire. The collapse of the empire initiated a period of relative decline, in which France
endured the Bourbon Restoration until the founding of the French Second
Republic which was succeeded by the Second French Empire upon Napoleon III's
takeover. His empire collapsed during the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. This led to the
establishment of the Third French Republic, and subsequent decades saw a period of
economic prosperity and cultural and scientific flourishing known as the Belle Époque.
France was one of the major participants of World War I, from which it emerged
victorious at great human and economic cost. It was among the Allies of World War II,
but it surrendered and was occupied in 1940. Following its liberation in 1944, the short-
lived Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the defeat in
the Algerian War. The current Fifth Republic was formed in 1958 by Charles de
Gaulle. Algeria and most French colonies became independent in the 1960s, with the
majority retaining close economic and military ties with France.
France retains its centuries-long status as a global centre of art, science,
and philosophy. It hosts the fourth-largest number of UNESCO World Heritage
Sites and is the world's leading tourist destination, having received 100 million
foreign visitors in 2023. A developed country, France has a high nominal per capita
income globally, and its advanced economy ranks among the largest in the world by
both nominal GDP and PPP-adjusted GDP. It is a great power, being one of the
five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and an official nuclear-
weapon state. France is a founding and leading member of the European Union and
the eurozone, as well as a member of the Group of Seven, NATO, OECD,
and Francophonie.
