FRANCE Law and Practice Contributed by: Thierry Marembert, Cécile Labarbe and Céline Serpagli, Kiejman & Marembert
6. Injunctive Relief 6.1 Circumstances of Injunctive Relief French law provides injunctive relief called provisional measures ( mesures conservatoires ) to achieve a broad range of objectives, such as: • safeguarding a right or a good (seizing money to secure a debt); • preserving evidence for a future action (seizing counterfeit goods); or • preventing immediate or irreparable damage. Conservatory attachments ( saisies conservatoires ) and judicial securities ( sûretés judiciaires ), for exam- ple, are provisional measures that enable a creditor to freeze real estate or movable assets, tangible or intangible, belonging to the alleged debtor. In order to demonstrate that there is no serious chal- lenge to the debt obligation and that some circum- stances are likely to threaten its recovery (late or non- payment, unsuccessful formal notice, insolvency of debtors, etc), it is sufficient for the debt obligation to appear grounded in principle (it is not necessary to be certain, of a fixed amount nor due). The measure is enforced upon prior authorisation from the enforcement judge. The requesting party must then bring an action on the merits within a short period, or else the judicial security shall become void. 6.2 Arrangements for Obtaining Urgent Injunctive Relief Claimants may introduce proceedings to obtain inter- im relief orders ( ordonnances de référé ), which do not have the force of res judicata on the merits but are provisionally enforceable ipso jure. Since a July 2025 Decree, the claimant may choose between the judge hearing the case on its merits or the judge of the place of enforcement. A party can quickly obtain interim relief introducing these provisional proceedings with mention of the hearing date. Such proceedings include the following. • Regular interim relief proceedings ( référé ordinaire ) before the president of the tribunal judiciaire or the
to evidence and strictly proportionate to the aim pur- sued, including when business secrets or privacy are at stake. 5.5 Legal Privilege French law recognises legal privilege under the concept of secret professionnel , under which any exchange of information between attorneys and cli- ents is subject to professional secrecy. The infringe- ment of professional secrecy, by either litigating or transaction lawyers (who are granted the same sta- tus), constitutes both a breach of ethical rules and a criminal offence. Therefore, respecting professional secrecy may impede the giving of certain documents or information. Business secrecy also allows a party to refuse to pro- vide certain sensitive material, where it is confidential or key to the party’s competitiveness. There is ongoing legislation to grant confidentiality to in-house counsels’ written consultations but it has not yet been enacted (as of 30 September 2025), so in- house counsel communications remain unprotected, unlike lawyers’ “professional secrecy”. 5.6 Rules Disallowing Disclosure of a Document The right to privacy (protected by both civil and crimi- nal law) can be another barrier to the production of some documents. For instance, a drone picture of a private property taken without the owner’s consent can be judged inadmissible if it was neither necessary nor proportionate. This example is indicative of the different approaches taken by, and the legal discrepancies between, French law and common law systems. For instance, the US uses discovery and the US Supreme Court applies serious sanctions on those refusing to provide infor- mation, whereas the Cour de cassation critiques fish- ing expeditions and protects other fundamental prin- ciples and interests under legal instruments, including the Blocking Statute of 1968, which prohibits any communication to foreign authorities of economic, industrial or technical information for the purpose of use as evidence, under the threat of criminal penalties.
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