A-Infos (en) France, Lamouette Enragee: The Precious Freedom to Display (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

Who would dare criticize the melodies and thunderous sounds of the 50th 
Côte d'Opale Festival? And who would have the whim to cut the power to 
the Poulpaphone nursery? That's a tune Frédéric Cuvillier and his big 
band can play on repeat; singing all summer long - just like in any 
other season - is perfectly fine with us. ---- Before the day really 
heated up, we, casual observers, with our little bucket in hand, set off 
as respectful citizens to remove, while also doing something useful, 
posters more deeply rooted in our shores than the very official Street 
Art. The so-called "free posting" boards would do the trick. However, 
besides the fact that these boards are currently reserved for 
institutional music, their number seems to be dwindling like everything 
else in the heatwave.

Properly Designated Notice Boards

The law requires municipalities to provide free posting boards. The 
existence of these boards, intended to ensure "freedom of opinion," is 
governed by Article L. 581-13 of the Environmental Code. This article 
specifies that it is the mayor's responsibility to designate spaces for 
displaying opinions and advertising related to the activities of 
non-profit organizations. Article R. 581-2 of the same code specifies 
the minimum surface areas that municipalities must provide, based on the 
number of inhabitants:

- 4 m² for municipalities with fewer than 2,000 inhabitants;

- 4 m² plus 2 m² for each additional 2,000 inhabitants beyond 2,000, for 
municipalities with 2,000 to 10,000 inhabitants;

-12 m² plus 5 m² per 10,000 inhabitants beyond 10,000, for other 
municipalities.

The law also requires that no point within the urban area be more than 1 
km from a sign. Finally, municipalities are required to inform citizens 
(directly or upon request) of the locations for free expression 
available within their territory.(1)

See also

Thus, in the Opalie region, Boulogne-sur-Mer is right on target with its 
11 signs (27 m²) for its 40,910 inhabitants - 1,000 fewer and one sign 
is lost. Meanwhile, in Saint-Martin, there are 9 locations for 10,999 
hectares - more than necessary? As for Wimille, there are no billboards 
for 3,888 hectares - one would have been enough.(2) This local photo 
illustrates a simple fact: municipalities literally do as they please 
when allocating space for posting notices.

More than 60% of municipalities nationwide do not comply with current 
regulations. While the prefectures "allow the State to ensure compliance 
with legal obligations regarding free posting," checks, formal notices 
to comply with the regulations, and the census of these violations are 
nonexistent.(3) In his written question to the Government on September 
30, 2025, LFI (La France Insoumise) MP Bastien Lachaud notes that 
"[some]town halls, reluctantly complying with the law, circumvent its 
spirit. They plan for free posting boards in notoriously unfrequented 
locations, on the outskirts of towns, in dead ends, behind garbage 
rooms, and other such schemes." Some go so far as to install billboards 
where the side designated for free posting is located just centimeters 
from a wall, making it impossible to post any information on them, let 
alone read it, while outwardly complying with the legal obligation. 
Others play it dangerous by allowing electrical boxes as a legal medium, 
even though they are explicitly considered illegal flyposting! Boulogne 
solved the problem by offering them to local artists for a street art 
project. (4) Even when untouched, many are covered in plaster, no doubt 
to protect them from foam party advertising.

Political expression: democratization...

In 1789, the Revolution seized control of freedom of expression, which 
until then had been reserved solely for royal and religious authorities. 
Besides the explosion of political publications, the walls became 
covered with notices, rants, news, and reports of political club 
meetings-of all persuasions, including monarchists-making their 
locations places for gatherings and public debate. Freedom of expression 
was absolute (for a time...); anyone could post a handwritten text as 
they pleased, from a radical diatribe to a poem. Most used colored paper 
to avoid being confused with laws, decrees, trial announcements (or 
their outcomes), and other official publications printed on white paper. 
This practice still exists...

As early as 1830 - and after the Napoleonic era, which curtailed 
virtually all freedoms, and the Restoration, uneasy with the press - 
Charles X sided with Polignac, the ultra-royalist Prime Minister: "It 
would be to deny the obvious not to see newspapers as the principal 
source of calamities threatening the kingdom[...]. No force, it must be 
admitted, is capable of resisting a solvent as potent as the press." 
These repressive measures in all areas would culminate in the July 
Revolution.

In 1848, posters, thanks to the development of lithography linked to 
industrial growth, were mass-produced and enriched by a colorful, 
allegorical revolutionary art, powerfully evocative of socialism and the 
Revolution, with striking slogans. The bourgeoisie will no longer be 
able to stem the inevitable tide of social and political demands, calls 
for strikes, and mobilization of the working class.

1871: Strangled by the war waged against it by the government in exile 
in Versailles, allied with the Prussians victorious in the 
Franco-Prussian War of 1870, the Paris Commune will be forced to ban the 
reactionary press.

...a smokescreen

The famous law on freedom of the press of July 29, 1881, did not appear 
out of thin air. The ruling classes imposed a legal framework on all 
publications, as well as on public displays in particular. It is also a 
prime example of how the French "legislature" can concoct schemes to 
pull the wool over our eyes. Often considered the founding legal text of 
freedom of the press and freedom of expression, this law effectively 
allowed the press to breathe and expand. But it is also the text that 
gives the Paris Commune a taste of its own medicine: the requirement to 
deposit a security deposit as a prerequisite for publishing newspapers 
is reinstated. The Republicans come to power in 1876. Five years of 
tough negotiations with the right wing of the "moral order" movement and 
the opinion press will finally conclude with the law we know today.(6)

So?

Well, not much!

Aside from the measures taken over the centuries by various parties to 
endorse the masses of regulations-whose mathematical formulas we neither 
know nor want to know-we will continue to express ourselves freely, 
participating in the well-known local political ferment.
Moreover, everyone involved in politics, whether professional or 
self-serving, will, in a few months, be lining up along dozens of linear 
meters of reserved and, in principle, sacred billboards. At least during 
the first round of the presidential election. After that, the bargaining 
will be in full swing.

The worst enemy of freedom of expression is the stifling of political 
debate. Let's get back to basics: let's re-wild the struggle! Let's be 
rugged, uncompromising, sticky as glue.

Keep in mind, comrade, that from its very adoption, the 1881 law is most 
often expressed in three words: NO POSTING.

(1) In most municipalities, the posting of opinions and non-profit 
organizations is permitted on construction site hoardings - Article 
L581-16 of the Environmental Code: "Municipalities have the right to use 
construction site hoardings for their own benefit as a medium for 
commercial advertising or free posting as defined in Article L. 581-13, 
when their installation has been authorized by the road authority." Town 
halls are required to publish the list of these authorized locations. 
Not found in Boulogne.

(2) Source: https://cocoricarte.fr/, a government website which you 
should visit to see the existence and locations of these panels. There 
is no equivalent on the Municipality's website.

(3) 
https://bastienlachaud.fr/2025/09/30/respect-de-la-loi-sur-les-panneaux-daffichage-libre/. 
Note the parallel fieldwork being carried out in several French cities 
to get free posting panels installed in your municipality - Online Help 
- Popular Action

(4) Well, there are still some left, but shh.

(5) Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of August 26, 1789
Article 10: No one shall be disquieted on account of his opinions, even 
religious ones, provided their manifestation does not disturb the public 
order established by law.

Article 11. The free communication of thoughts and opinions is one of 
the most precious rights of man: every citizen may therefore speak, 
write, and print freely, subject to being held accountable for the abuse 
of this freedom in the cases determined by law.

(6) https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/loda/id/LEGITEXT000006070722

Boulogne-sur-Mer, July 18, 2026

https://lamouetteenragee.noblogs.org/post/2026/07/20/la-chere-liberte-dafficher/
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