Talk:Territorial collectivity

[Untitled]
Under the title Administration, I wanted to mention the presidents of the collectivities, not of their assemblies. It is not always the same.


 * This article needs translating into English. Placing note here so that I can find it again to translate. --Bob 08:02, 24 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The article appears to be in English - guess Bob did his job.--Caen 22:59, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

The first paragraph does not make it clear that these "Territorial Collectivities" are political subdivisions of France per se - I initially supposed it could refer to divisions of other countries as well. Perhaps this is due to translation (as mentioned above) from French.--Caen 22:59, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Edited first paragraph to indicate this term applied to France.--Caen 23:41, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Hello I believe to understand that there is no English notion corresponding to the assembly of words "territorial + collectivity" which seems to be created by google translation tools. I believe to understand that the most meaningful transposition of the French "collectivité territoriale" into english could be "local authority". Actually I believe that the issue here is that if similar words exist in different languages, it does not necessarily mean that they (or their assembly) have the same meaning, or a meaning at all. I recommend the term "territorial collectivity", which is a French invention, to be removed.Bruno.Cadorini (talk) 11:04, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Harping on the metropolitan/overseas distinction
This article reflects a tendency I see to harp on the distinction between France's metropolitan regions and departments and overseas ones. The overseas entities have the same status as the metropolitan ones, so to me this is akin to constantly referring to the 49 mainland states and 1 overseas state (that is, Hawaii) of the United States—which is something that isn't done. We just talk about the 50 states. Is there a good reason for following this practice for France? —Largo Plazo (talk) 13:06, 14 December 2015 (UTC)

Translation of collectivité into English
Rendering the French word collectivité as "collectivity" is more a transliteration than a translation. No less an authority than the French Government, on the English-language version of its official website (for example, here), uses "community" as a translation of collectivité. Shouldn't we do the same here at the English Wikipedia? — Jaydiem (talk) 20:29, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
 * That link is bad. It redirects to http://be.france.fr/. —Largo Plazo (talk) 13:46, 22 January 2016 (UTC)
 * "Collectivity" is the way it's typically translated. The Oxford English Dictionary shows the word used in English to mean "The collective body of people forming a community or state" at least as early as the 1880s. I don't know why the French government's page would use "community", given that that is the translation of their word "communauté" (as in the EU's earlier name, la Communauté européenne, the European Community). In any event, I don't think the Académie française lets anglophone countries dictate what things will be called in French, so I would go with common usage among English speakers, not what the French presume to dictate to us. —Largo Plazo (talk) 13:55, 22 January 2016 (UTC)
 * If a literal translation were required, then isn't collective more direct; OED gives the earliest example of such a use, to discuss a political collectives, as c1600. However, one of the reference on the page lists the official English translation of the term (accoring to the The Council of Europe French-English Legal Dictionary) as Territorial authority. Hence, I suggest changing the page name to Territorial authority (France), then fixing the redirect page Territorial authority to distinguish this from Territorial authorities of New Zealand. Klbrain (talk) 11:42, 4 July 2016 (UTC)


 * To all the above, you can not consider collectivité by itself to translate in the right context. By itself, collectivité generally means a small public institution, like a school or retirement home, and most accurately translates as 'community'. In this sense, it is not exactly synonymous with communauté, which also means 'community'. Communauté is more along the lines of a community of like-minded people, or having common characteristics, or people working on a common cause or project. Neither context has to do with state or local government administration. When talking about administration, there are generally two pairs of terms in French government documentation. One is collectivité locale, meaning administration that's inferior to the French State, and translates to 'local authority', or in some places 'local government'. The other term is collectivité territoriale, meaning an administrative subdivision, which translates to 'regional authority' or 'regional government'. These terms are not necessarily different in meaning. Indeed INSEE seems to treat them equally but points out that collectivité territoriale is the more official term. This seems to be supported by the actual code itself, the Code général des collectivités territoriales. Nevertheless, there is a collectivité locale portal, but I would not be distracted by that. The previously mentioned 'code' is the top-most legal document on the subject. But, as we might clearly see, the translation, 'regional authority', is somewhat problematic due to the term 'regional', which might confuse people about the different geographical categories of authority. So, in my humble opinion, you can either swap 'regional' for 'territorial' (i.e. territorial authority) or stick with 'territorial collectivity'. I would point out, though, that while the immense OED might define 'collectivity' (I'm not sure, I don't have access to it), the abridged Oxford Dictionary of English does not, suggesting it might be considered an archaic term in English. I would suggest looking in the OED again and see if the term is marked as 'archaic'. If so, then I would favour using 'territorial authority'. (Btw, for matters of single word translation in general, I recommend seeking the wisdom of the wonderful people in the French Word Reference community, and the phone app is also invaluable.) --Rootwarden (talk) 13:04, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Contradiction
The lead and the Categories section imply that all the regions and departments of France, including Metropolitan France, are territorial collectivities. Then, under Other Facts, it reads, "Corsica is the only collectivité territoriale that is within metropolitan France". So, which is it? All those other regions and departments are territorial collectives, or they aren't? Largoplazo (talk) 21:58, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
 * For this and the other issues put forth above, I've just tagged the article as needing expert consideration, possibly from someone at WP:WikiProject France. Largoplazo (talk) 22:01, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
 * This question is still outstanding. I've added cite needed to try and hurry it on. If this doesn't work, I think we must contemplate deleting the Corsica line, on the grounds that it is better to say nothing than to say something contradictary. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 11:00, 15 May 2018 (UTC)