World News: Art, Culture, Business and the Political Divide

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Category: World News - Europe

Published on Tuesday, 19 May 2026 11:45

Written by Olivier Longhi

The open crisis between the world of cinema and Canal +, the leading private financier of the French seventh art, raises questions about the growing hold of far-right business circles on the cultural world and freedom of expression.

The crisis which threatens freedom of expression in favor of an ideological orientation of cultural creation exploded, when Maxime Saada, president of Canal +, the leading private financier of French cinema, in the middle of the Cannes Film Festival, announced that he no longer wants to work with nearly 600 artists outraged by the progressive hold of Vincent Bolloré (editor's note: a businessman close to far-right circles), on the world of cinema, the press and publishing.

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Saada's announcement provoked a strong reaction at the top of the State where the Minister of Culture Catherine Bégard, denounced a disproportionate reaction from the head of the television channel.

If the controversy will only last for a while and will eventually die out on its own, it is nonetheless symptomatic of a slow but certain takeover by Vincent Bolloré in the sectors mentioned above. And that's where the problem lies.

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Cultural Proposal

With the tutelage of part of the artistic and literary circles by a man who clearly displays his ultra-liberal and extremist positions, the risk of seeing the appearance of a uniform and oriented cultural proposal, in the service of an ideology or a party, is inevitable.

One year before the presidential election, in a context of heavy social tension, the rise of the far right in the polls and public opinion, all bathed in an international context giving pride of place to the hardest and most liberticidal positions, from Trump to Putin, via Netanyahu and Xi Jing Ping, it has become obvious that the takeover of culture in the broad sense of the term by a billionaire without limit to the positions entrenched is a peril.

This list of six hundred artists, which, paradoxically and contrary to its original intention, takes the form of an inventory with Macarthyist overtones, finally lays the foundations for a kind of Manichean struggle, between the defenders of free and unfettered creation against the defenders of a controlled and oriented cultural proposal. Some, and rightly, would see it as an attack on freedom of expression in a country that is nevertheless renowned for bringing down all attempts at liberticide.

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Open Battle

However, faced with a public opinion more concerned about its purchasing power and the price of a liter of diesel than about the future of French cinema or this or that publishing house, it is also to be feared that the open battle against Vincent Bolloré will turn in favor of him, by knockout or by weariness. The weakness of the mobilization outside the circles concerned suggests an outcome, at least uncertain, at worst already written, for the actors of a free culture.

The stakes are high, however, as it refers to the fundamentals of democracy, the one that allows everyone to think, write or film what they want and not think, write or film what an ideological diktat wants to see written or filmed. From manipulation to censorship, from eviction to reframing, French culture is currently experiencing a worrying upheaval, while the public authorities, long financiers of this same culture, have in fact ensured its protection and independence, are suffocating.

Because, by chance or by chance, the State, today constrained by an abyssal debt, must prune its spending. And culture, the spearhead of democratic life, is experiencing this bitterly. Financially unable to save it, the State leaves the place free to the merchants of the temple who will sell it to the highest bidders by adorning it with their attributes and not with those who keep it alive.

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Bio: Olivier Longhi has extensive experience in European history. A seasoned journalist with fifteen years of experience, he is currently a professor of history and geography in the Toulouse region of France. He has held a variety of publishing positions, including Head of Agency and Chief of Publishing. A journalist and recognized blogger, editor, and editorial project manager, he has trained and managed editorial teams, worked as a journalist for various local radio stations, was a press and publishing consultant, and was a communications consultant.