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Before the 1914 war, the " pays" was already commonly opposed to the administrative division, i.e. the "département." The " pays" was thought to be more in line with the natural divisions of French space. The law on planning and development passed in June 1999 made it possible to constitute "regions" by regrouping local councils of various sizes even beyond the territorial limits of the "département." After a century of rural exodus, accelerated urbanization, and a crisis that transformed the industrial society, general support of the republican regime is accompanied by constant criticism of the centralization of the State and persistent attachment of the French to a kind of rustic mystique.