At-a-glance guide to France

The Gallic game of seduction, terrible TV and three-course lunches for the workers
main beach of Nice
Summer holidays on the main beach of Nice, in the south of France. It remains the most visited country in the world Photograph: Valery Hache/AFP/Getty Images


Charlemagne, hundred years war, ancien régime, renaissance, Reformation, the Sun King. A revolution that changed the history not just of France, but the world. A republic (briefly) until Napoleon Bonaparte made it an empire; wars all over the shop. Another republic, a second empire, a third republic, devastation in the first world war, occupation in the second. Charles de Gaulle, the Fifth Republic, bye bye Algeria, a leader among European nations. Cheese-eating surrender monkeys. What more is there to say?


Metropolitan France (excluding the overseas territories, or Dom-Toms) occupies more than 200,000 square miles, more than twice the size of the UK. From the damp plains of the Nord-Pas de Calais to the sun-baked beaches of the Med, the snowy peaks of the Alps to the verdant valleys of the Dordogne, the barren fastnesses of the Massif Central to the lush, cream-marinated meadows of Normandy and the urban delights of Paris, Toulouse and the rest, France just about has it all. This explains why it remains the most visited country in the world, and why the French are so infuriatingly proud of it.


A republic with a hybrid presidential-parliamentary governing system. The president, elected every five years, has more influence than most other European presidents: he promulgates laws and can delay them if he doesn't like them; he can call referendums; appoint prime ministers (but not dismiss them); and name senior officials. He also has his finger on the nuclear button. The president is supposed to be the glory of France incarnate, which is why swearing, chewing gum and marrying an ex-supermodel three months after meeting her have not done wonders for the popularity of the incumbent, Nicolas Sarkozy.


Nearly 63 million in metropolitan France – almost exactly the same number as the UK. It would be nice to say something about their diversity but France does not keep statistics based on ethnicity or religion. No one knows how many residents are of Arab or African origin, how they perform at school, what percentage are jobless or in prison. This is because the most sacred article of all in France's grand republican creed is that everyone is equal and indistinguishable in the eyes of the state. It's a great ideal, but not of much help when it comes to, for example, analysing why youths from immigrant-heavy, employment-light suburbs periodically set fire to cars.


Politics matters more than almost everything else in France, except lunch. The main parties are Sarkozy's centre-right UMP and the Socialist party, or PS, headed by Martine Aubry. The anti-immigrant National Front, now led by Marine Le Pen, who inherited the position from her ex-paratrooper father Jean-Marie, regularly scores highly (17% in the 2002 presidential elections, when Le Pen Sr famously knocked the Socialist prime minister, Lionel Jospin, out of the race) but hasn't won any parliamentary seats since the mid-1980s. Despite all that, the French distrust politicians and the same party rarely triumphs twice in a row. This may even hold true in 2012, despite the French left remaining incapable of organising the proverbial beuverie in a brasserie.


Not the basketcase that Anglo-Saxon prejudices would lead you to believe. GDP is almost $2.2 trillion (£1.36tn), marginally higher than the UK, but unemployment has climbed to about 9.5%. The budget deficit rose to 7.8% of GDP last year, and public debt to 84%, as the government spent on stimulus and investment measures. However, France has weathered the economic crisis better than many. On the whole, the French still believe firmly that free-market capitalism is not very nice to people and needs taming through laws, taxation and spending priorities.


First of all, proud to be French and reluctant to believe that anything, anywhere can be as beautiful, as bountiful, as benificent and as well-run as France. Second of all, frequently unhappy – and not shy about showing it. Averse to the concrete, the particular, the anecdotal; in love with the abstract, the general, the theoretical. Often accused of rudeness; actually infinitely courteous (we just don't always understand their codes). Obsessed with appearance: in sports, for example, grace and style and le beau jeu (the beautiful game) matter more than mere results.

Food and drink

OK, so French cuisine may be resting on its laurels, and the Michelin star system may have long ago disappeared up its own fundament, but this remains a country where you can to walk into a small-town provincial restaurant and confidently expect to find half a dozen men in builders' overalls sitting down to a three-course lunch, which says something about the importance of food to France's popular culture. And of course wine made anywhere else is obviously not worth drinking.


For a country with such a rich, varied and influential cultural and artistic tradition, French television is, for the most part, unmitigated crap: game shows, variety shows, reality shows, debate shows. This is because (my theory, anyway) the talent tends to go into the cinema instead.

Love and Sex

French men and women are permanently engaged in the great and grim Gallic game of seduction. Flirtation is the norm, infidelity accepted and very much expected, at least in certain circles. Women pout and stamp and toss their hair and generally behave badly towards men; men smoulder and stare and make no secret of their intentions towards women. It can be irritating, but it is arguably better than embarrassment and bad jokes.