Against All Odds – A Story of the Parliamentary Decision in the French Parliament

In 2012, the Women Rights Delegation in the French National Assembly suggested to pass a bill forbidding the purchase of sexual acts. Most ministers and a large portion of MPs ranged from not enthusiastic to fully opposed to the idea, making it statistically unlikely the law would ever come to be. Yet, in 2016, the bill was passed. This paper offers to dissect the process that led to this surprising success in-depth, in order to hold out a better understanding of the weight of procedures, party cohesion and media-coverage on parliamentary decision. The success of the bill can indeed be attributed to four strategies. Firstly, the use of reasonably discrete procedures and of the margins of the parliamentary calendar allow the bill to develop, overcoming the overloaded agenda problem. Then, an intra-partisan campaign of systematic lobbying is put in motion by MPs, alternating between threats and friendship pleas, turning party discipline from unsurpassable obstacle to political resource. Moreover, abolitionist groups and MPs synchronize to keep prostitution on the news, making sure the media coverage favours them. In the end, a prostitution-related political scandal serve as an opportunity to enlist the government as a supporter of the bill.