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Since 2010, a series of legal frameworks and fiscal arrangements in France have promoted the consolidation of existing municipalities (= communes) into “new municipalities”. From 2012, and especially in 2015-2016, there have been numerous mergers (from 36 571 municipalities in 2012 to 34 841 on January 1st, 2019); although the phenomenon remains marginal compared with the total number of municipalities, given that France now has almost 800 new municipalities. Based on interviews with public actors and statistical analyses of national data, this research describes the phenomenon of new municipalities, first by presenting it as a new response to recurrent criticisms in France targeting municipality level of government. These mergers are further analyzed by showing their motivations, the reconfiguration they impose, all taking into account permanence, including intercommunality. The unequal spatial distribution is finally discussed, describing clustered spatial patterns in some regions however no single type of merging municipality could be specified.