Far-Right Media Tycoons Are Poisoning French Democracy
French presidential candidates are meant to have equal access to the airwaves. But the buildup to this month’s election instead shows how unaccountable billionaire media owners can set the political agenda — and promote astroturf far-right candidates.
Vincent Bolloré of the Bolloré Group arrives for a hearing before a Senate committee on media concentration in January. (THOMAS SAMSON/AFP via Getty Images)
The specter of media concentration has become a central question in France, with public debate dominated by right-wing culture war obsessions ahead of the first round of the presidential election this Sunday. With anti-immigrant candidate Éric Zemmour’s latest sallies flooding the news in recent months, the country has been reminded of the enormous power of large press conglomerates.
Just in the last year, France has witnessed the consolidation of two new media poles.
One is a fresh expansion of the media empire of billionaire tycoon Vincent Bolloré. In the mid-2010s, he acquired the Canal+ group, which included the future CNEWS, the Fox-like channel infamous for hosting Zemmour as a prime-time pundit. He has embarked on a massive expansion of his media empire and is currently in the process of absorbing the Lagardère media group into the Canal+ orbit. The move heralds the advent of a fully integrated far-right media sphere encompassing publishing, advertising, television news, radio, and print publications.
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