Like many non-English-speaking approaches, the Francophone "cultural industries" tradition of the political economy of communication, although internationally recognized, is largely invisible in non-Francophone countries. Seeking its institutionalization in specific regional, historical, epistemological, and political contexts, it has nonetheless produced original categories for a critical analysis of changes in the media industry, alongside broader socioeconomic changes within capitalism. This article articulates two dimensions:

It presents the history of this Francophone cultural industries tradition and its social, political, and scientific contexts of emergence along with its theoretical arguments-linking the latter with the former. It particularly focuses on the tradition's methodology of "socioeconomic modeling" and the theoretical propositions this methodology gave rise to in a materialist analysis of the changing media landscape.