European Collectivity of Alsace

European Collectivity of Alsace Collectivité européenne d'Alsace (fr)
Location of Alsace in the european part of the French Republic
Status		Collectivity of the French Republic
Capital and largest city		Strasbourg
Official language		French
Regional languages		Alsatian Welche Meridional Frankish Rhine Frankish
Demonym		Alsatian
Government
•	President of the departmental council	To be elected
Legislature		Assembly
Establishment
•	Creation	1 January 2021
Area
•	Total	8,280 km2 3,197 sq mi
Population
•	2019 estimate	1,887,985
ISO 3166 code		FR-A

The European Collectivity of Alsace (French: Collectivité européenne d'Alsace) is a future territorial collectivity of the French Republic. On 1 January 2021, the departments of Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin will cease to be part of the region Grand-Est and will merge into a single collectivity. The creation of this new entity was voted by the French Parliament on 25 July 2019 and Law 2019-816 delimiting its powers was promulgated on 2 August 2019.

History

Main article: Alsace

Status

Due to its status of single collectivity, Alsace is similar to Corsica and to some extent the overseas departments and regions. Its competencies are both the ones of a region and a department.

Languages

While French is the sole official language of the country according to Article 2 of the Constitution of France, Law 2019-816 contains provisions to promote regional languages at school. The collectivity will also be tasked to create a Comitee related to the German language in Alsace. This last provision is closely related to Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 of the Aachen Treaty.