Free expression at risk: CNews and media pluralism in France

The French media landscape was shaken by a controversial decision by the Council of State, the highest administrative court in France. This decision asks Arcom, the media regulator, to strengthen its control over the CNews news channel. This directive raises major concerns about freedom of expression in France and highlights the risks of arbitrariness in the media field.

CNews, a politically right-wing television channel, has often been at the centre of heated debates. However, the decision by the Council of State to intensify Arcom's control of this channel appears to go beyond simple regulation and could have serious implications for the diversity of opinions in the French media landscape.

Freedom of expression is a fundamental pillar of any democracy. It guarantees the right of citizens to express their opinions, even the most controversial, without fear of reprisal or censorship from the state. The media is supposed to have a crucial role in holding governments and institutions accountable.

As the fourth estate, they must monitor abuses of power and provide a different point of view than government institutions. It is when jurisdictions arbitrarily restrict this freedom or when deputies, like Sophie Taillé-Polian¹, request the withdrawal of the TNT channel from an information channel that we can only worry about the health of a democracy.²

The decision of the Council of State is part of a worrying trend of decline in freedom of expression in France. Over the years, we have seen an increase in measures aimed at restricting speech considered “controversial” or “offensive.” These measures are often justified in the name of combating disinformation or hatred, but they only create a climate where only opinions conforming to the standard set by the authorities are tolerated.

The arbitrariness of the Council of State's decision is all the more worrying as it opens the door to selective and partisan regulation of the media. Why specifically strengthen control over CNews and not another news channel like France Inter, for example? The latter can hardly be perceived as a model of pluralism.

The station's speakers and hosts are often affiliated with specific media and political movements: Nicolas Demorand and Thomas Legrand from Libération, Pierre Haski from Rue89, Léa Salamé, former i-télé and companion of Raphaël Glucksmann, comedians whose opinions are often aligned with those of La France Insoumise, Salomé Saqué of Blast, Marc Fauvelle, formerly of i-télé, and Claude Askolovitch, affiliated with the Socialist Party.

The reaction of journalist Thomas Legrand on the decision of the Council of State is sufficient in itself: the problem with media like CNews is their conception of “journalistically established truth.” Are we to believe that there would be a truth and a journalistic truth? For Mr. Legrand, those who work at CNews are not journalists: they are people “who do not have the same notion of established truth.”

We can specify that they do not have the same notion of the truth established in the journalistic microcosm and reach a different audience from mainstream media like France Inter. However, should we strengthen control over a news channel which only represents 2.3% of audience share in 2023?³

Specifically targeting a news channel that positions itself on the right of the political spectrum sets a dangerous precedent where media regulation is used as a tool to suppress dissenting voices. What about the feasibility of such a control measure? The idea of quantifying talk time and using it as a metric may seem simple in theory, but it overlooks the nuances and complexities of the modern media landscape.

A quantitative approach risks reducing public debate to a simple question of mathematics, forgetting the quality and relevance of the discourse. It could lead the media to invite speakers solely to fill quotas, rather than for their expertise or their real contribution to the debate of ideas.

Pluralism can only flourish in an environment where free expression is preserved. Restricting freedom of expression under the pretext of ensuring respect for pluralism, as the Council of State does, is to kill pluralism.⁴ And those who rejoice in it may sooner or later end up suffering the consequences themselves, since we all suffer from a lack of freedom of expression one way or another.

This article was written by Élodie Keyah. Élodie is a French writer and campaigner with Young Voices Europe.