ABSTRACT
With a total of 2,913 separate titles published in 1990, the press in contemporary France encompasses a wide spectrum of printed material.1 It includes local, regional and national newspapers, published daily and weekly, catering for a variety of tastes, interests and points of view. It also comprises specialist magazines and periodicals, which seek to satisfy the myriad demands for information, education and entertainment of a variegated, heterogeneous society. The geographical, social and cultural diversity of France is to a large degree reflected in the richness of its press. So too are different shades of economic, party political and ideological opinion. Taken at face value, the press industry in France produces a very broad range of products-from simple local freesheets to glossy international magazines-from which consumers can make their choice. As a result, the French press appears to be a system of bewildering complexity, whose main characteristics tend to militate against the formulation of simple overarching generalizations.
