Hallowed in course titles and leveraged in the nomenclature of international organizations, yet unfit to bring any clarification or synthesis that actually provides structure, the objectifying expression communication internationale has no scientific value, except as a research object.
Yet, the expression bears meanings that must urgently be put into perspective, since it lends itself to discursive construct which often varies greatly according to the crossed—and often masked—interests of an ever-increasing number of actors on a global scale and based on the political-cultural fields where these tactical productions are disseminated.
The first option for an enlightening approach is through the thread of an academically recognized discipline. More specifically, the introduction of information-communication science in France in 1978 opens up a corpus of theoretical approaches and epistemological questionings that are already meaningful, although they are limited to a single country.
Taking notice of the multiple and sometimes competing scientific productions and collaborations that extend this time to whole continents, the crossed questioning reveals epistemological, theoretical, conceptual, and methodological inflections that support a provisional state of the research. Then, the concept of communication-monde, sketched by Armand Mattelart and elevated to the rank of structuring concept in the book, enables us to read the global stakes of communication as we step into the third millennium and acts as a decentring force against the permanent risks of ethnocentric thinking.
