Delegation and Resistance: Intendants and the Centralization of the French State

Over the seventeenth century, France relied mainly on private agents to build its state capacity but it shifted gradually to public agents, the intendants. We document this centralization process. The intendants' appointment occurred at different times across the country. Their alternating arrivals and departures in the généralités created sequences of presence and vacancy that our empirical strategy leverages. Using an original panel dataset, we identify a causal effect of the intendants' presence on tax revenues, tax and food riots. Before the 1635 Edict that permanently installed them, they operated occasional missions. They turned to be effective immediately-increasing tax revenues-but only in the pays d'états, provinces that kept the privilege to negotiate on taxation. Under Richelieu and Mazarin governments, from 1635 to 1660, they resisted as the intendants' presence triggered a decrease in tax revenues. In the less autonomous provinces, the pays d'élections, the intendants' presence led tax revenues to increase but it caused tax riots. Finally, the institution reached its maturity under Colbert and his successors: tax revenues increased sharply everywhere but so did tax riots. Moreover, the regulations taken by the intendants were insufficient to cope with food riots.