["JCMS: Journal of Common Market Studies, EarlyView. ", "\nAbstract\nThe article contributes to the emerging scholarly literature on how European democracies respond to foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI), whilst focusing on a single case study of France. It asks how France responded to Russian FIMI and why this response has become more forceful and comprehensive over time. Drawing on insights from neoclassical realism and role theory, the article argues that France's comprehensive capacity and institution building can be explained by adaptation to a new national role conception of defender of the liberal international order. The evolution of the French approach to foreign interference is illuminated by the two‐level game model, where international role‐taking is shaped by domestic role support and contestation. Empirically, the article analyses the process of institutionalisation and evolution of French counter‐FIMI policies: from selective and defensive institution‐building to a more comprehensive and offensive approach featuring transnational institutional diffusion."]