Less than one in eight fiction seen in France was directed by a woman

MEDIA – There is still a long way to go. Less well paid, more precarious, minority in positions of responsibility: inequalities still persist for women in the media, whether in the press, audiovisual or cinema, according to a study published this Thursday, September 15 by the Association For Women in the Media and Audience.

This extensive surveypresented during the La Rochelle fiction festival, depicts the evolution of parity between 2010 and 2021 in audiovisual, cinematographic and animated film production, post-production, television broadcasting, radio broadcasting and the press, i.e. nearly 290,000 jobs.

Starting with audiovisual production, the branch that employs the most in the media (about 130,000 people). In this area, the findings in terms of parity are similar to the entire sector, yet the study highlights the flagrant lack of women in the production of fiction in France.

They thus represented 23% of all fiction directors who were active between 2016 and 2020, according to data from the National Center for Cinema and the Moving Image (CNC). On the other hand, over this same period, only 12% of the hours of fiction were strictly produced by women. A cruel finding, as the French audiovisual landscape is so full of talented female directors who have won many awards on the international scene for their work: Audrey Diwan’s Golden Lion in 2021 for The event or the Palme d’Or for Julia Ducournau with Titanium this same year, to name but a few.

Precarious and still in the minority

And while the average salary per woman has increased faster than that of men since 2010, they “remain less remunerated overall”these representing 44.1% of the workforce but only 41% of the payroll, underlines the study by Audiens, a group for the social protection of media and culture, and PFDM.

Women are also more exposed to job insecurity because they are the majority among holders of fixed-term contracts (51.8% of fixed-term contracts) and more often hired part-time than men (18% against 10%). They also remain in the minority among employees on permanent contracts (46.7%).

Climbing the hierarchical ladder has not become easier: 23.1% of business leaders in the sector are women – this proportion rising to 39.5% in television broadcasting -, while they are overrepresented among administrative employees. (64.3% of positions).

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