(en) France, Alternative Libertaire AL #236 - The anti-repressive Dico: What is censorship? (fr, pt)

Censorship seeks to prevent public expression (books, films, plays, speeches, port symbols 
...). It may be the work of all power: thus, before the State, the Church has long been 
the first censor. Economic power through the control of the press and broadcasting, is 
without doubt the most effective today. ---- However, in a liberal regime, censorship is 
not supposed to exist: it is defined as the a priori control of public expression, which 
no longer exists in France since 1830 (except during the Second Empire, in time war and 
the theater until 1905). Note that the law of press control passed in 1955 with the state 
of emergency during the war in Algeria, has never been repealed. A democracy is normally 
merely a posteriori control the effects of freedom of expression. It can therefore condemn 
for disturbing public order, but also for the crime of "gross indecency."

Without being called "censorship", this verification is equally draconian or more a priori 
censorship is often ineffective. During the First World War, control of the press was so 
strict that the soldiers did not believe all the communication of the authorities. The 
indecency and the accusation of "pornography" helped convict writers (including the 
naturalist movement), but also publications explaining contraceptive methods. The effect 
is to cause fear among authors they censor themselves, but also among broadcasters (Radio 
France decided in 1975 not to publish the title "Hexagone" Renaud ...)

In the name of "disturbing public order" that "rogue" laws of 1893 and 1894 are voted 
against the anarchists conviction provocations "indirect" to illegal acts, can charge for 
"conspiracy "people who have verbally approved illegal and ban any expression deemed" 
anarchist "(the latter being the only law to be repealed in 1992 ...). If these laws have 
been effective in closing the then existing anarchist papers, it has failed to halt the 
development of a libertarian expression in the next twenty years. During the war in 
Algeria, the convictions of the press, particularly for "undermining the morale of the 
army," also aimed to bankrupt this release: Libertarian, organ of the libertarian 
communist Federation, had to cease publication in 1956 .

Renaud (AL Alsace)