Journalistic independence in France

Via a long chain of googling too tedious to repeat, I find a wonderful poll on public attitudes towards French journalists. My interest was drawn to the question on public perceptions of journalistic independence. Two questions are asked, one on independence from political parties, and one on independence from economic concerns. Here's the time-series on independence from political parties. Only one third of French people believe journalists are independent.

	Rappel enquête SOFRES								Déc 2001
	nov 1993	déc 1994	déc 1995	déc 1996	déc 1997	déc 1998	déc 1999	déc 2000
From political parties and the powerful
Yes, they're independent No, they're not independent Wouldn't say	32 56 12	33 55 12	28 62 10	30 59 11	27 64 9	32 59 9	28 60 12	32 59 9	33 55 12

Unfortunately, the question wasn't asked for different channels, so there's no direct way of telling whether journalists from France Televisions are judged less independent, say, than journalists from TF1. (One could run cross-tabs on main channel watched and perceptions of independence, but the link would be tenuous).

In general, the news isn't good for France Televisions: whilst in 1989, 43% of respondents cited either France 2 or France 3 as their most trusted source of television information, compared to 33% who said the same of TF1, the gap has now swung in TF1's favour, with 41% citing it as their most trusted source, compared to the joint total of 35% for France 2 and 3, with the latter gaining impressively.