France
87 YouTube · 2 TikTok- 89
- channels
- 48.6k
- videos
- 22.8k
- transcribed
- 12.6M
- comments
- BLAST, Le souffle de l'info457M
- Psyhodelik187M
- Naj B Fit160M
An observatory of political YouTube and TikTok.
YouPol tracks more than 100 political channels and accounts in France, Quebec and the United States. Using machine-learning and artificial-intelligence methods, the observatory collects, archives and analyses the videos, what they say and the reactions they draw from the public.
Every video published by the tracked channels is transcribed, summarised and counted by our local models. This panel gathers the synthesis of the last seven days, the records to read, the themes, the public figures named, the arguments and the removals; the three countries together or one of them, as you choose.
The content mainly addresses democratic tensions, security, and the economy. In France, left-wing channels denounce systemic racism and police repression, while the far-right emphasizes insecurity and judicial leniency. Positions differ regarding the authenticity of Mediapart's investigations into Jordan Bardella. Economically, left-wing social demands contrast with far-right calls for reduced public spending and libertarian financial advice.
France Dominant topics include Jordan Bardella's writings, insecurity in certain neighborhoods, and the crisis in the educational system. Left-wing channels analyze far-right communication and social inequalities. The far-right denounces state failure and the instrumentalization of youth. One conspiracy theory channel mentions a restriction of public liberties via Europe.
Quebec Discussions focus on the Canadian economic crisis, bureaucratic management, and the judicial system. Far-right and conspiracy channels analyze the attractiveness of the United States and corporate bankruptcies. The far-right also criticizes the justice system and opposes affirmative action in criminal sentencing.
The content focuses on national identity, artificial intelligence, gender relations, and political institutions. Positions vary by orientation: the manosphere criticizes feminism and analyzes celibacy, while the left denounces the instrumentalization of youth and neoliberalism. Libertarian and far-right orientations focus on entrepreneurship, taxation, and the impact of AI, while linking national recovery to patriotic pride.
France Videos cover national priority, education, and economics. The cultural orientation analyzes national priority from two opposing angles. Libertarian and far-right channels discuss AI applied to entrepreneurship and schooling. The left focuses on radical ecology and the legitimacy of political radicalism. The manosphere develops an ideological critique of feminism.
Quebec Content is exclusively driven by the manosphere orientation. The videos analyze the difficulties of romantic encounters and female celibacy.
Topics of the claims in 256 records: Institutions and democracy (16%), Economy and labour (13%), Security and justice (12%), Education and culture (9%).
The most viewed videos of the week, in each country, whose content synthesis is produced by our local model; each opens in a side panel.
Mediapart published an investigation into writings attributed to Jordan Bardella between 2013 and 2015, described as "antisemitic" and influenced by Alain Soral Mediapart. Clément Viktorovitch claims these messages rely on classic fantasies and serve a strategy to banalize Jean-Marie Le Pen's ideology Clément Viktorovitch. Jordan Bardella denies authorship, denouncing a "barbouserie operation" Mediapart, while other contributors describe the documents as a "gross fake" Mediapart.
Vincent Lapierre documents an increase in crime and vandalism in La Souterraine, Creuse Vincent Lapierre. He asserts that the State no longer respects the "social contract" because taxes no longer guarantee security. A contributor in this video attributes these disturbances to "migrants" Vincent Lapierre.
Le Fil d'Actu argues that the government uses the Russian threat as a diversion to hide the failure of economic policies regarding rising fuel prices Le Fil d'Actu - Officiel. Simultaneously, Idriss J. Aberkane claims that Europe uses the war context to restrict public liberties Idriss J. Aberkane, Ph.D x3.
The content focuses on education, technology, and social tensions. Libertarian channels advocate for adapting education to AI and highlight the greater attractiveness of the US tax system. Far-right channels emphasize the utility of AI for content creation and the importance of professionalization through official structures. The culture channel compares national priority to the occupation under Marshal Pétain and characterizes this discourse as hate speech.
Regarding political and social issues, left-wing channels denounce the government's instrumentalization of youth and justify radicalism as a response to neoliberalism. Conversely, libertarian channels attribute the country's lack of recovery to a deficit of patriotism. Finally, the manosphere criticizes contemporary feminism, accusing it of promoting hatred toward men and absolute independence.
Topics of the claims in 199 records: Institutions and democracy (16%), Security and justice (14%), Education and culture (11%), Gender and family (10%).
The most viewed videos of the week, in each country, whose content synthesis is produced by our local model; each opens in a side panel.
The analyzed content mainly focuses on economy, immigration, and technology. Far-right channels argue that Canada is heading toward total bankruptcy and claim that Quebec must reduce its immigration thresholds. They link the departure of workers to the United States to a lack of opportunities and criticize Justin Trudeau for favoring private interests. Regarding technology, they present artificial intelligence as an essential tool for visibility, while warning about the emergence of an uncontrolled "super intelligence."
Conspiracy theory channels attribute rising fuel prices to an organized effort to create inflation and accuse the World Economic Forum of planning the collapse of supply chains. They view calls to slow down AI development as a competitive strategy. Manosphere channels focus on health, opposing the biopsychosocial model to the biomedical model and addressing the concept of "food noise" and eating disorders.
The channel Camron Diffusion, oriented towards the manosphere, comments on testimonies from women expressing their loneliness. The videographer claims that female celibacy results from excessive selectivity or a desire to obtain a man above their own social value. He argues that feminist ideology has stripped women of their seduction assets by making any service toward men degrading and adds that dating apps are ineffective as they promote ghosting and aesthetic discrepancies.
Maxime Ouimet, oriented towards the far right, criticizes the print newspaper advertising model, which he calls the "dinosaur generation." He claims this model is obsolete due to a lack of automation and performance metrics. He suggests that French-speaking entrepreneurs in Florida use his digital directory to prioritize organic visibility and geolocation.
Topics of the claims in 53 records: Economy and labour (29%), Institutions and democracy (18%), Immigration (11%), Technology (10%).
The most viewed videos of the week, in each country, whose content synthesis is produced by our local model; each opens in a side panel.
Content in preparation: it will appear here as soon as it is ready.
The most viewed videos of the week, in each country, whose content synthesis is produced by our local model; each opens in a side panel.
October 2026: mean over 83 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 53 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 19 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 9 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 2 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 69 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 42 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 19 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 8 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 11 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 11 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
October 2026: mean over 0 videos; each video counts once. Since 2016
Coming soon: the theme classifiers are trained on French, and their English counterparts will soon be trained and deployed. Meanwhile, this country’s channels are transcribed and summarised.
Number of transcribed sentences naming them; bar: channel orientation; line: twelve months. Closed list of public figures. The full ranking
Number of transcribed sentences naming them; bar: channel orientation; line: twelve months. Closed list of public figures. The full ranking
Number of transcribed sentences naming them; bar: channel orientation; line: twelve months. Closed list of public figures. The full ranking
Number of transcribed sentences naming them; bar: channel orientation; line: twelve months. Closed list of public figures. The full ranking
Arguments drawn by our local model from a sample of each theme’s political sentences, then checked against the sentences. All the arguments, by theme
Arguments drawn by our local model from a sample of each theme’s political sentences, then checked against the sentences. All the arguments, by theme
Arguments drawn by our local model from a sample of each theme’s political sentences, then checked against the sentences. All the arguments, by theme
Content in preparation: it will appear here as soon as it is ready.
120 videos removed in 120 days; a video transcribed before its removal keeps its record.
109 videos removed in 120 days; a video transcribed before its removal keeps its record.
11 videos removed in 120 days; a video transcribed before its removal keeps its record.
No recent removal observed.
Each channel is chosen and coded by the team: an orientation, a country, a language. The far right is deliberately over-represented, to study it closely; the American channels, in English, are transcribed and summarised without going through the classifiers, which are trained on French.
Six methods, run on the project’s computers, each documented with its models, thresholds and reliability. Pick a step.
The channels’ RSS feeds are read every six hours; every week their full list of videos is reread. A detected video enters the queue with its date; those of the last seven days go ahead of everything else.
The video, its metadata and its comments are extracted; the audience is measured again at day 1, 7 and 30. A removal is recorded with its reason when the platform gives one, and a transcribed video keeps its record.
The voice is isolated from the music (Demucs), speakers told apart without being identified (pyannote), then Whisper transcribes each speaking turn in the spoken language, detected by windows. Turns are cut into sentences (SaT).
Each sentence is classified as political or not by a classifier trained on human annotations, then assigned to nine themes by nine binary classifiers. Their reliability (F1, checked precision) is published.
The public figures, parties, organisations, media and countries of a closed list are recognised in the sentences by checked patterns and counted video by video. A private person named in a video is never counted.
A local language model writes for each video of the week a record in French and English: title, summary, claims and their speakers, public figures named. The record is checked against the transcript; a name that could be a private person’s holds it back. The records feed the week’s synthesis and the arguments by theme.
The method in full · The methods paper (PDF) · Cite the project
Postdoctoral researcher · co-lead
Sciences Po Paris · Université du Québec en Outaouais
Postdoctoral researcher · co-lead
Université de Sherbrooke · CIRST · RFICS
Research collaborator
CEVIPOF · Sciences Po Paris
The team and the affiliations · Write to us · Cite the project