Media organization

In France, the Higher Audiovisual Council (in French “Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel”, CSA) is the body that aims to guarantee the freedom of audiovisual communication. Among its missions, the CSA is responsible for assigning frequencies to the different operators.

The French audiovisual landscape refers to the entire French audiovisual offer, including free and pay television channels, broadcasted nationally or locally.

TV

In France there are 9 national public channels: France 2, France 3 (the channel also offers regional and local programs), France 4, France 5, France Ô, Franceinfo, La Chaîne parlementaire (LCP-Assemblée nationale et Public Sénat) and Arte (Franco – German channel).

There are also many private channels (some free, others not) such as TF1, M6, W9, BFM, CNews, LCI…

RADIO

The public radios are not subject to a CSA authorization to broadcast: it is up to the government to decide whether to assign a frequency to them. Some of them are gathered within Radio France, which offers 7 stations: France Info, France Inter, France Culture, FIP, Moov ‘, France Bleu, France Musique.

The public radio sector also includes RFO (Radio France Outremer), which serves the overseas regions, and France Médias Monde, in charge of external radio action. The France24 news channel as well as RFI (Radio France Internationale) and MCD (Monte Carlo-Doualiya) are part of the France Médias Monde group.

There are also many commercial radio stations (some are local and some national): Europe 1, RTL, NRJ, Fun Radio, RMC…