Understand everything about the issues of the war in Ukraine, discover our investigation into Cyril Hanouna, flush out the false scientific assertions of an Idriss Aberkane, find out more about Elon Musk’s crazy projects… But also read our revelations on psychodrama to the socialist party, to interfere in the workings of the CGT, or to savor the cross interview between Giuliano da Empoli and Andreï Kurkov: all this will be possible on February 16, for a day of exceptional free access. Occasional reader or loyal subscriber, you have the opportunity to read or reread them, to introduce them to those around you, to share them, to comment on them.
L’Express celebrates its 70th anniversary in 2023. Seventy years of a committed, reforming and demanding newspaper, which has always known how to embrace modernity and move with the times. Three years ago, L’Express changed its format, its model, its formula, with the ambition of bringing analysis and hindsight to a changing world. By keeping in its heart the ideas of progress that make up its identity. To read L’Express is to adhere to important values: secularism, the Republic, economic liberalism, openness to the world, rationality… In 70 years, that has not changed at L’Express .
Today, nearly 70 journalists work every day to provide you with the best stories, investigations, interviews and analyses. L’Express today is also exclusive interviews with the personalities of our time, great stories, where our journalists give you the secrets of power. A newspaper that dismantles received ideas and undertakes to provide you with reliable and verified information.
A selection of our essentials
Yuval Noah Harari: “If we don’t stop Putin, it will be devastating for all of us”
He is one of the most influential thinkers on a planetary level, the first “global intellectual of the 21st century” according to The Economist. Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Yuval Noah Harari has sold 35 million copies of his essays Sapiens, Homo Deus And 21 lessons for the 21st century (Albin Michael). When a crisis as destabilizing as the invasion of Ukraine by Russia arrives, his analysis is therefore eagerly awaited.
> Read our exclusive interview
Hanouna tyranny told from the inside: “Don’t name me, he scares me”
Cyril Hanouna never imagined becoming President of the Republic, but he did consider running for the presidential election of 2022. At the start of 2021, he tied up the scenario with his teams. The host wants to get into the deep end during a program produced by his company, H2O, on C8, Coluche style. The dailies of Do not touch My TV (TPMP) would then show it in the markets, to the mayors, in search of the five hundred signatures. The “Hanouna 2022” brand was registered with the INPI in February 2020, so that someone else would not “do anything”, specified the presenter. And then, surprise… the troublemaker of the PAF gives up. In reality, the plan is only destined to punctuate his show by making one of those real-fake soap operas that captivate nearly 2 million people every night. Not show politics, but politics in the service of the show. “Cyril Hanouna has staged himself for years in stupid situations, but his number one spring is power. He understands very well the social and political capital he holds, what he can do with it”, warns the communicator Philippe Moreau Chevrolet.
Vincent Bolloré, story of a succession
It is a luxury usually reserved for stars of the big screen or of song. The last role, the final singing tour before leaving the stage and slipping away from the halo of spotlights. On February 17, 2022, Vincent Bolloré, one of the most powerful bosses in France, promised to hand over the reins of his industrial and media empire to his heirs. Never has a business leader so staged, almost “theatricalized” his passing of the torch. Until writing the legend himself with this application installed on his smartphone which counts the hours and minutes separating him from this damn date. The date, precisely, owes nothing to chance. The Bolloré group celebrated its 200th anniversary on that day and, a few weeks later, the man celebrated his 70th birthday. Transmit to hope for the eternal. Bolloré, the Janus-Catholic boss – seductive and carnivorous by day, solitary and secretive at night – is haunted by this idea of transmission. “He’s been talking to me about it for at least twenty years,” breathes his friend, the socialist and former mayor of Quimper, Bernard Poignant.
Emmanuel Macron: the secret history of the hatreds that tear those around him
This windy evening of February 2022, the ghost of La Fontaine floats over the dinner which brings together at the Elysée a dozen guests around the president who will soon be a candidate. The most informed observers of the scene and the campaign distinguish three clans distributed like this: the “technos” embodied by Alexis Kohler, “brain” of Emmanuel Macron – secretary general of the Elysée -, responsible for the working groups supposed develop the program; David Amiel, young normalien and former Elysian adviser; and Pierre Bouillon, enarque at the head of the ideas division of En Marche – let’s call them team A. The collaborators, represented by the special adviser in charge of communication Clément Léonarduzzi and Jonathan Guémas, presidential pen – let’s call them team B. Finally the politicians, interpreted in particular by the gruff Richard Ferrand, president of the National Assembly, and the cunning François Bayrou, great chief of the MoDem – let’s call them team C.
> Read our big story
Stanislas, the elite college that advocates female “modesty” in the face of boys’ “urges”
That was three months ago, or “maybe two”. Sarah * no longer has very clear memories, so much the experience she lived “shocked” her. As part of the three annual sex education sessions, provided by law since 2001, the 14-year-old schoolgirl learned that she had to “be modest, so as not to be the object of the gaze of boys”. “The teacher said that it was the message of our body, when at puberty hair begins to cover our genitals,” she says. Marie *, another schoolgirl, abounds: “For her, the boys had impulses of life, and it was necessary to adapt to them. As everyone is afraid of being fired, no one dared to contradict her.”
Idriss Aberkane, itinerary of a mystifier
He presents himself as a “hyper doctor” holder of three doctorate titles, proclaims himself a specialist in neurosciences, biology, geopolitics, computer science, philosophy or even in personal development and even tries to rap. He claims to have graduated from the greatest universities and swears to have solved one of the most thorny mathematical conjectures (that of Syracuse). He also dreamed of himself as the French Elon Musk by launching his disruptive companies, and finally came close to the tops of the literary hit parades with the book Free your brain (Robert Laffont, 265,000 copies sold). Idriss Aberkane is a rising star spotted in the media firmament in 2016: barely 30 years old, the “young man in a hurry” is the subject of a dithyrambic portrait in an evening daily and the front page of a major weekly. Since then, he has fallen from his pedestal. If Idriss Aberkane manages to impress thanks to his eloquence, his ambitions have often come up against reality and those who have revealed his deceptions. Itinerary of a spoiled child who got spoiled.
Osteopathy, this strange French madness
Professor Emeritus at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, Edzard Ernst has devoted a large part of his career to the evaluation of alternative medicine. Trained in homeopathy and chiropractic, this naturalized British German initially believed in the value of these practices, until he began to sift them through scientific analysis. Author of numerous reference works and publications, he does not hesitate to criticize methods that are devoid of any validity, nor to defend those that can bring a benefit. For L’Express, he analyzes the theoretical foundations and practice of osteopathy, “a very French madness”.
> Read the chronicle
Nuclear: investigation into a spectacular comeback
If I had to choose a symbol, it would undoubtedly be this one. Ten years ago now, on September 14, 2012, Japan wiped the slate clean of its old energy policy. Still bruised by the dramatic consequences of the Fukushima disaster, the archipelago and its Prime Minister Shinzo Abe gave themselves thirty years to get out of civilian nuclear power. On August 24, 2022, the current head of the Japanese government, Fumio Kishida, undoubtedly sent this promise back to the dustbin of history. By announcing his desire to restart as many reactors as possible stopped after 2011, as well as a reflection on the construction of new models, the Liberal Democrat is reconnecting with the thread of his country’s history with the atom.
> Read our survey
Amélie Nothomb, the unpublished investigation
For many, Amélie Nothomb is a hat, a dark silhouette and the publication of a new book at each literary season. As she celebrates her thirty years of writing, we wanted, at the Express, to go beyond the character. Who is she really? What secrets does she hide behind her apparent volubility? Fourth and final part of our series dedicated to the novelist with 16 million copies sold.
> Read the first episode
> Read the second episode
> Read the third episode
> Read the fourth episode