🚨 Reliable information, critical thinking, participation: the democratic roadmap for 10 and 25 years
🔍💡 Democratic resilience: reliable information, media education and citizen participation — three levers that intersect with health promotion.
🧭 A diagnosis (mistrust, abstention, misinformation, AI) and pathways to 2035-2050 transferable to the health and social care field.
📌 This focus is not a health text, but it addresses three levers that structure health promotion: the quality and reliability of information, media education and critical thinking, and citizen participation. The diagnosis — mistrust of institutions, abstention, misinformation amplified by AI — directly intersects with the issues of health infodemic and health democracy. The pathways (informational resilience, « prebunking », participation embedded in decision-making, rule of law literacy) are transferable to a prevention project, a community action or training. Useful for situating one's action in a weakened democratic context and for arguing the health role of critical thinking.
Source :
📒 How will we live in France tomorrow? — Democracy Focus: « Building a resilient democracy in the face of threats
✍️ High Commissioner for Strategy and Planning (HCSP). Focus reproducing a chapter from the report « How will we live in France tomorrow?
📜🔗LINK to the source
1️⃣ Analytical summary
A democratic foundation deemed threatened, against a backdrop of a transformed informational space
The focus states that the values of liberal democracy (fundamental rights, rule of law, separation of powers, pluralism) appear today to be threatened, both from within and from without, by illiberal agendas that present themselves as more effective (p. 6, 13-14). It links this fragility to the transformation of the media space: rise of platforms, algorithmic personalisation, economic weakening of media producing information, massive dissemination of false information and the growing role of generative AI (p. 7-12). The target audience is broad — citizens, public decision-makers — and the identified issues are the decline in electoral participation, distrust towards institutions and the erosion of adherence to the democratic model (p. 18-22).
Two horizons and concrete levers for public action
The text is organised into two horizons: 2035 (strengthening the democratic foundation and public debate) and 2050 (consolidating resilience and making Europe a democratic "vanguard"). It proposes operational levers for public action: support for quality information and restructuring of press subsidies (p. 10-11), algorithmic transparency and "CERN of informational environments" (p. 11-12), information resilience policy through "prebunking" and media education (p. 12), consolidation of the independence of the judiciary and the Constitutional Council (p. 16-17), and strengthening of citizen participation embedded in the legislative cycle (p. 22-25). The vast majority of the proposals fall under argued public policy options, not interventions at an established level of proof.
2️⃣ Key points of the document
1️⃣ A unbalanced informational space. Platforms capture attention and advertising revenue without bearing the costs of information production; by 2030, digital actors would capture 65% of net advertising revenue (52% in 2022), at the expense of media that invest in content (40% → 29%, or ≈ 800 M€ lost) (p. 7-8).
2️⃣ Disinformation, amplified by AI. Weighted estimates by exposure measure 11% of false or misleading content on X, 15% on Facebook and up to 25% on TikTok; generative AI could exacerbate this risk by producing low-cost credible content (p. 9-10, 12).
3️⃣ A policy of informational resilience. The document proposes sustainable mechanisms for "prebunking" (preventive demystification), a strengthening of media education in the school curriculum and support for digital parenting, plus a alert system on foreign interference (p. 12).
4️⃣ A targeted but massive institutional distrust. 82% support the democratic principle but 76% believe it is functioning poorly; trust is low for the National Assembly (20%) and the presidential institution (22%), and much higher for the mayor (60%) and the municipal council (58%) (p. 19-20).
5️⃣ A aspiration for more participation. Abstention is read as a critique of the functioning, not a rejection of the democratic ideal. The text proposes conventions and citizen consultations, a more effective shared initiative referendum, a right of follow-up for citizen initiatives, and the opening of the vote at 16 years on an experimental basis (p. 22-25).
3️⃣ Action points for local actors
Reminder : this focus is not a health guide. The points below are transpositions to the field of health promotion, consistent with the text but not prescribed by it.
1️⃣ Link media education to health literacy. Rely on the logic of "prebunking" and critical thinking (p. 12) to equip the public and professionals against health misinformation — a direct bridge to psychosocial skills and literacy.
2️⃣ Strengthen participation in your systems. Translate the requirement for articulation participation ↔ decision (p. 23-24) in local projects: co-construction, user councils, participatory health budgets, ensuring the concrete "outcome" of the opinions collected.
3️⃣ Secure the public voice and the source. Reaffirm the requirement for "reliable, independent and contradictory" information (p. 10, 27) in your materials: cite verifiable sources, distinguish fact / estimate / opinion, trace the intermediation circuits.
4️⃣ Target the young and parents. Develop support for digital parenting and media education (p. 12) in youth actions, in line with mental health issues and screen usage.
5️⃣ Name a coordination marker. Like the « referent » and the shared doctrine recommended against interference (p. 12-13), designate in the team a contact point for « health information / disinformation » to react proactively rather than reactively.
6️⃣ Strengthen the literacy of the rule of law and rights. Draw inspiration from the « EducDroit passport » proposed in secondary (p. 17) to integrate, into your health education actions, the knowledge of institutions and rights — the foundation of empowerment and access to rights.
Unmet need indicated by the text itself: the practical obstacles to voting are not considered a major cause of abstention (p. 24); the issue mainly lies in the effective consideration of existing participatory mechanisms, not their creation.
4️⃣ Additional references
Internal reference — Health Practices
Health literacy: from individual competence to the responsibility of organisations LINK .
3 external references post-2024 (URLs verified on 22/09/2026)
1️⃣ CLEMI — Activity report 2024-2025, « CLEMI, a lever for democracy ». Public operator of media and information education: concretely extends the « informational resilience » and EMI aspect of the focus. clemi.fr — Activity report 2024-2025
2️⃣ Report on health misinformation (Mr. Molimard, D. Costagliola, H. Maisonneuve), submitted to the Ministry of Health, January 2026. Bridges the gap between misinformation, literacy and « health democracy »; official file: sante.gouv.fr — Fight against health misinformation
3️⃣ Public Health France — Health in action no. 469 (May 2025), « Acting for health with citizens ». From health democracy to democracy in health: transposes the participation aspect of the focus to the health field. santepubliquefrance.fr — Health in action no. 469
Epistemic reserve: the 3 external URLs have been opened and verified; titles and dates are those displayed at the time of writing.
5️⃣ Frequently asked questions (FAQ)
1️⃣ « Does « HCSP » refer here to the High Council of Public Health?
No. In this document, HCSP = High Commission for Strategy and Plan (author of the focus). The acronym is identical to that of the High Council of Public Health: be sure to specify this in training (p. 5, annex).
2️⃣ What are the two horizons of the text?
2035 : strengthen the democratic foundation and public debate in the face of pressures (p. 7-17). 2050: consolidate French democratic resilience and make Europe a democratic « spearhead » (p. 17-27).
3️⃣ Are the figures cited produced by the HCSP?
No. These are data cited from other sources (Arcom 2026, CEVIPOF – Political Trust Barometer wave 17, Ministry of the Interior, etc.). The focus takes them up and puts them in perspective (p. 7-9, 18-22).
4️⃣ What is « prebunking »?
A « preventive demystification »: raising awareness upstream about sources, narrative manipulations, AI and « deepfakes », and verification reflexes, rather than correcting afterwards (p. 12).
5️⃣ What does the text say about trust in institutions?
Trust is low at the national level (presidency 22%, National Assembly 20%) but high at the local level (mayor 60%, council municipal 58%); 82% support the democratic principle but 76% consider it poorly applied (p. 19-20).
6️⃣ What concrete avenues are there for participation?
Citizen conventions on polarised topics, local consultations and referendums, effective RIP (lower threshold, « reversed » procedure), right of follow-up for citizen initiatives, experimental opening of voting at 16 years (p. 23-25).
7️⃣ How is this relevant to a health actor?
By transposition: health misinformation, literacy, user participation, media education, empowerment. The focus provides the democratic framework; the health operationalisation falls under the references of section 4.
6️⃣ Rewriting in Easy to Read and Understand (FALC)
What is this document about?
This text is about democracy in France.
It is written by a state service that prepares for the future.
It looks at France in 2035 and 2050.
It wants to protect democracy against dangers.
What the document says (main ideas)
Many people no longer trust elected officials.
Many people no longer vote.
But people still believe in democracy.
On the internet, there is a lot of false information.
False information harms democracy.
We must help people to distinguish the true from the false.
What the document proposes
Help the newspapers that provide serious information.
Learn at school to read information properly.
Protect the judges and the laws.
Allow citizens to participate more in decisions.
Work with Europe to protect democracy.
Attention
Trust is stronger for the mayor than for the state.
This text provides ideas. They are not yet laws.
7️⃣ Cross-cutting analysis — Values of Health Practices
Literacy : yes — media and information education and knowledge of the rule of law are presented as skills to be disseminated (p. 12, 17).
Empowerment : central — the goal is to "give back democratic agency": participation, citizen initiatives, voting (p. 22-25).
Participation : at the heart of the text — conventions and citizen consultations, RIP, right of follow-up, articulation with decision-making (p. 22-24).
Community health: indirect — the collective logic of deliberation and "democratic reserve" resonates with community action, without a specific health theme (p. 22, 25).
Ethics : presents — pluralism, integrity of information, transparency of influences and funding (p. 10, 17).
Human rights: explicit support — rule of law, separation of powers, independence of the judiciary, public freedoms (p. 14, 16).
Intersectorality : yes — information, justice, education, Europe, civil society, research (p. 10-12, 16, 25-27).
Partnership : formalised — support for democratic civil society, democratic patronage, European cooperation (p. 17, 25-27).
Fight against discrimination: addressed indirectly — vigilance regarding the weakening of counter-powers and vulnerable audiences in the face of disinformation; no dedicated treatment of discrimination (p. 11, 14).
8️⃣ Evaluation of the reliability of the resource
Scientific relevance: high institutionally — recognised public author, multidisciplinary working group, dense network of academic and institutional references. Important caveat to convey: these are argued public policy proposals, not interventions at a graduated level of proof (no A/B/C scale as in an HAS reference framework). The numerical data is cited from other sources and of different natures: declarative surveys (CEVIPOF, Arcom), modelled projections (advertising revenues 2030) and estimates based on weighted samples (share of false content). Each type calls for a calibrated reading.
Operational relevance: indirect for the health field. The focus offers a strategic framework and ‘three key propositions’ (p. 29) that can be mobilised in arguments, training or advocacy, but no directly applicable procedure in health promotion. Its practical utility depends on transposition (see section 3) and on the operational references in section 4.
9️⃣ Strategic hashtags
#healthpractices #Democracy #InformationResilience #MediaEducation #MediaLiteracy #CitizenParticipation #HealthMisinformation #HealthDemocracy
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