From Mali to Martinique, every four years the best athletes from the French-speaking world gather for the Francophone Games. Monocle’s Steve Bloomfield reports from Nice on the event, which to France is about more than…
Artist Pierre-Yves Berhin (nom de plume ‘Hamo’) draws us in to the witty animated tale of how ‘bande dessinées’ became a bastion of soft power for Francophone storytellers and beloved by readers of all ages. Only in Monocle…
Big-name French pharma was conspicuously absent at this year’s annual Pharmagora fair. But far from fading into obscurity, the Paris show has been looking to Francophone African markets and the lucrative bio-organic sector…
The arts festival Le French May is in full swing in Hong Kong today with the opening of the city’s largest exhibition of paintings by the impressionist Claude Monet at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum. The long-running annual…
News network France 24 is a broadcaster working across three languages in order to deliver a nuanced French view of global affairs. With its ever-increasing reach, it’s a channel catching the little details that competitors…
Somaliland does democracy (while the rest of the world denies the country's existence), Yemen's president claims he's been a crime-fighting success (while his country goes into meltdown), and it's back to school in Gaza …
Nothing represents the shifting sands of global politics better than the African Union’s gleaming new HQ in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A gift from the Chinese, it’s proof of the Asian giant’s growing clout. But the Germans are…
At any time in history there are countries on the way in or out – breakaway states eager for independence or now clamouring to be reassimilated into their former motherlands. This is the current crop of nations in waiting…
As foreign goverments and corporations circle Senegal’s newfound energy resources, its stable and progressive capital, Dakar, is learning how to best channel its influence and growth.
Jealous of the British-inspired Commonwealth Games and the Jeux de la Francophonie for nations of the former French empire, Portugal has created the Jogos da Lusofonia. In a world of soft power, pole vaulters and sprinters…
French influence spans the globe, be it the wine you drink, the car you drive or the clothes you wear. It’s soft power with a swagger and Breton stripe too.
The French hoist the flag over the new military base in Abu Dhabi, fence yourself in army style and how to stope Iran getting a nuclear bomb (it wont be easy).