Le Monde
Le Monde is a French newspaper founded in 1944 by Hubert Beuve-Méry. It is the most widely read paid national daily newspaper in France, with 2.44 million readers in 2021, and the most widely circulated, with around 500,000 subscribers, including 414,000 digital subscribers and 87,000 print subscribers.
It presents itself as a "newspaper of record". Former editor Éric Fottorino preferred not to describe the newspaper as a "newspaper of record", stating instead that it was "not just any newspaper", but rather one that "claims to become the reference, an alloy of competence and editorial independence built over several decades". It is nevertheless widely regarded as such, including internationally.
Le Monde is the last French daily traditionally described as an "evening paper". It is published in Paris in the early afternoon with the following day's date, and later in some major cities, before being distributed elsewhere the next morning.
According to Radio France, Le Monde has adopted successive editorial lines since its founding, generally located, albeit reductively, on the centre-left. A 2010 academic work also characterises its editorial stance as centre-left. In April 2022, an Ifop survey indicated that among regular readers of Le Monde, 48% voted for left-wing candidates in the first round of the 2012 presidential election, and 27% voted for Emmanuel Macron.
Le Monde is owned by Groupe Le Monde. Its shareholding structure includes the holding company, notably owned by Xavier Niel and Matthieu Pigasse, and the, held by employees, trade unions, and associations.
History
1944–1968: Foundation and establishment as a newspaper of record
The first issue of Le Monde was published on 18 December 1944, dated 19 December 1944, and consisted of a single double-sided page. It succeeded the newspaper Le Temps, which had been shut down under the targeting publications that appeared during the German occupation of France during World War II. The premises of Le Temps were requisitioned and its equipment seized. Le Monde, as beneficiary of this confiscation, adopted its format and layout, took over much of its editorial staff, workers, and employees, as well as its former offices on Rue des Italiens, where it would remain for 44 years. This location earned it the nickname "the Rue des Italiens daily".General de Gaulle, who wished to provide France with a "prestige newspaper" oriented toward international affairs and serving as an unofficial voice of the Republic, was a driving force behind its creation. He tasked his Minister of Information, Pierre-Henri Teitgen, with finding a director, a difficult task since many press figures of the time had either collaborated during the occupation or were already leading newspapers of the clandestine press. Georges Bidault, president of the National Council of the Resistance, suggested Hubert Beuve-Méry. Beuve-Méry hesitated for a long time, as he sought to run a newspaper independent of political, economic, and religious powers.
On 11 December 1944, Hubert Beuve-Méry founded the limited liability company Le Monde with capital of 200,000 francs divided into 200 shares. Its first editorial committee also included René Courtin, a professor of law, and Christian Funck-Brentano, formerly responsible for press matters in General de Gaulle's cabinet. Like Le Temps, the daily was intended for elites, and reached a circulation of 150,000 copies as early as 1945. Born in the shadow of political power, Le Monde gradually emancipated itself under Beuve-Méry, who secured its editorial independence during the Cold War and the First Indochina War.
Employees have played a central role in the management of the newspaper. In 1951, the Le Monde Journalists' Society was created to safeguard the paper's editorial independence. It was initially allocated just over 28% of the shares of SARL Le Monde. In 1956, Le Monde became the owner of its building at 5 Rue des Italiens. From the early 1960s onward, its circulation expanded rapidly, tripling over 20 years, from 137,433 copies in 1960 to 347,783 in 1971, and nearly 500,000 by the late 1970s.
This financial and editorial independence was also political. The newspaper became a meeting point for several major currents of thought, primarily linked to Christian democracy in domestic affairs and to moderate anti-colonialism in foreign policy.
These positions generated debate. In addition to tensions with de Gaulle, Jean-Jacques Servan-Schreiber, head of the foreign affairs section, left the newspaper in the early 1950s, criticizing what he saw as its neutralism in East–West relations. In 1954, Le Monde diplomatique was launched. In 1955–1956, the Conseil national du patronat français, chaired by Georges Villiers, considered Le Monde too left-leaning and decided to support the launch of a competing daily, . The operation was coordinated by, a former close adviser to Pierre Laval. When the first issue appeared in March 1956, Beuve-Méry was reassured by what he considered the competitor's mediocre quality; publication ceased after only a few months.
In 1957, the newspaper refused to publish an article by Jean-Paul Sartre on the use of torture during the Algerian War. Under the Fifth Republic, the newspaper supported General de Gaulle's foreign policy, while criticizing his domestic policies.
1969–1981: Evening newspaper of the centre-left
Hubert Beuve-Méry, the founder of the newspaper, retired in 1969. During the 1970s, the paper clearly moved toward supporting the Union of the Left and denounced the financial scandals that erupted under the Presidency of Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. The strong hostility of the newspaper's journalists toward Valéry Giscard d'Estaing was examined in a 2014 investigation entitled Le jour où... « Le Monde » choisit de torpiller Giscard.In her investigation, Raphaëlle Bacqué revisited the Diamond affair as it was experienced within Le Monde and emphasized the highly political nature of its coverage. She noted in particular the general hostility of the newsroom's journalists toward Giscard d'Estaing and their closeness to the Socialist and Communist opposition. She also described internal debates between those, such as political editor Raymond Barillon, who were cautious and reluctant to relay the revelations of Le Canard enchaîné, and others, such as columnist Philippe Boucher, who strongly opposed "Giscardism" and wanted to push the story further by linking it to additional revelations, including those reported by Minute concerning a building permit obtained by Raymond Barre and information about the African assets of Giscard's cousins. Philippe Boucher, later appointed to the Council of State by François Mitterrand, acknowledged in 2014 that he had been somewhat excessive in his handling of the affair.
At the time, although the editorial line did not explicitly claim to be left-wing, it was generally sympathetic to revolutionary socialist movements, going so far as to headline "Phnom Penh liberated" when the city was taken by the Khmer Rouge in April 1975.
In 1981, Claude Julien succeeded Jacques Fauvet. Readership was then at its peak. The newspaper supported the candidacy of François Mitterrand in the 1981 French presidential election. After the Socialist candidate's victory, Jacques Fauvet wrote in the 11 May 1981 issue:
Following the election, the newspaper's open support for François Mitterrand cost it a significant number of readers.
1982–1994: Financial and editorial difficulties
In 1985,, who had succeeded Claude Julien in 1982, was removed from the newspaper's leadership following a decline in circulation. While the paper had sold an average of copies between 1974 and 1981, circulation fell to copies in 1985, dropping below the break-even point. Laurens was criticized in particular for his relationship with François Mitterrand's brand of socialism.He was replaced by André Fontaine. Under Fontaine, the editorial line distanced itself from Mitterrandism, notably expressing skepticism about the nationalization policy pursued by Pierre Mauroy. The sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in particular allowed the newspaper to demonstrate its independence and led to a rebound in sales. Le Monde subsequently took a leading role in exposing scandals of the Mitterrand era, such as the Irish of Vincennes affair and the. A marked animosity then developed between Mitterrand and the newspaper, targeting in particular journalist Edwy Plenel. Several Le Monde journalists were subjected to.
In 1985, BNP required the newspaper to sell its historic building on the Rue des Italiens. Le Monde moved to 15 in April 1989, into a building designed by architects Pierre du Besset and. It later relocated to 21 bis in 1996, and finally, in 2004, to Boulevard Auguste-Blanqui in a building designed by architect Christian de Portzamparc, whose architecture was inspired by the former headquarters of The New York Times.
In 1989, due to competition from Libération and the revival of Le Figaro, circulation had declined by copies over a ten-year period.
In February 1990, a triumvirate was appointed to succeed André Fontaine. Composed of Daniel Vernet, , and Martin Desprez, it was ultimately replaced, following internal rivalries, by Bruno Frappat, who remained head of the newsroom, and economist Jacques Lesourne. Lesourne was elected director of publication of Le Monde on 8 January 1991, becoming the first non-journalist to hold the position.
1994–2003: Colombani's expansion strategy
In 1994, Le Monde changed its legal status from a limited liability company to a public limited company with an executive board and a supervisory board. Following the resignation of Jacques Lesourne, who had been unable to halt the decline in circulation and advertising revenue, Jean-Marie Colombani, editor-in-chief, was elected director of publication of the newspaper in March 1994, first by the journalists' association and then by the newspaper's shareholders. In April 1994, he appointed Noël-Jean Bergeroux as editor-in-chief. In 1995, Colombani launched a new format for the daily newspaper.During the 1995 French presidential election, Colombani's hostility toward Jacques Chirac following the Ouvéa cave hostage taking, the anti-Mitterrand stance of Edwy Plenel, and the globalist outlook associated with Édouard Balladur and promoted by Alain Minc, chairman of the supervisory board of SA Le Monde, led the newspaper to be accused by its peers of "Balladurism." Le Canard enchaîné headlined on 18 January 1995, "Le Monde Balladurized? It's not a Minc affair," a controversy that unsettled part of its readership.
After an initial recapitalization of 295 million francs in 1995, Le Monde launched its presence on the Internet in 1996. LeMonde.fr offered online feature packages, a graphical version of the front page from 1:00 p.m., the full newspaper before 5:00 p.m., current news in cooperation with the Agence France-Presse, and sections devoted to the stock market, books, multimedia, and sports. Two years later, full online access to the newspaper cost five French francs, compared with 7.50 francs for the printed edition. Some articles from the weekly print supplement Télévision-Radio-Multimédia were made freely available online in a multimedia section later renamed "New Technologies."
Re-elected in 2000, Jean-Marie Colombani undertook the construction of a media group, the Groupe Le Monde. After an unsuccessful attempt to acquire L'Express from Vivendi Universal Publishing in 1997, he took control of the group in 1999 and acquired a 30% stake in the "Publications de la vie catholique" in 2003, notably including La Vie, Courrier International, and Télérama, whose real estate assets were later sold. In 2002 and 2003, more than €60 million were raised through bonds redeemable in shares, increasing an already high level of long-term debt.