The merits and demerits of a global language Adopting a global language would greatly reduce the transaction costs of conducting business across nati...

The merits and demerits of a global language
Adopting a global language would greatly reduce the transaction costs of conducting business across national borders¹. It would greatly facilitate the transmission of knowledge. It would help people of different backgrounds understand each other more readily and might curtail hostility and contribute to conflict resolutions and more generally to peace. Some even hope that "prejudices and stereotypes would be dismantled or differentiated, and more flexible cooperation (not merely in the context of the economy) would become possible²". Many a sociologist, however, would warn that increased communication among groups can actually increase conflict. One can though take it for granted that a global language would reduce gross misunderstandings when international agreements and treaties and laws are given different means as result of being translated into a variety of languages.

In an age where the benefits of a global language are not actively considered, some examples from the European Union highlight these merits. As of January 1, 2007 the EU has 27 member states and 23 official languages³. The EU stresses the importance of multilingualism among its citizens, explaining:

languages are not a mere means of communication. They contribute to a better knowledge of other European cultures and have a real potential for a deeper understanding between European citizens. Multilingualism policy aims at ensuring multiculturalism, tolerance and European citizenship. Widespread general competence in foreign languages also plays its part in keeping xenophobia and intolerance at bay. We have to understand each other if we want to reap the full benefits of the cultural, social, and economic richness of our continent⁴.

However given that no one can learn all the languages of the EU, if more and more European would learn the same second language, this would great enhance such an understanding. However no movement is underway to choose such a shared second language.

The absence of an official, shared EU language causes a significant portion of the total EU budget, $1.3 billion a year, to be dedicated to interpretation and translation of the official transcripts, documents, court rulings and regulations into all the 20 official languages⁵. In addition to exacting considerable costs, numerous misunderstandings arise because of subtle and not so subtle differences in interpretations result from these multiple translations. This point is illustrated by a simple example. The European Central Bank (ECB) is required to use all EU languages for official purposes⁶. In 2006, ECB president Jean-Claude Trichet outlined a change in policy using the simple words "strong vigilance". Translated across the various languages the words communicated different positions. In Spanish these terms were translated as extrema vigilancia, which sounds much stronger than the English original and could lead Spanish observers to worry that, "the central bank is facing galloping inflation". Thus, even with a team of terminologists dedicated to the task of carefully parsing official bank language, it is difficult to preserve nuance across the numerous languages in which the ECB must produce official statements and reports⁷.

At the same time, introducing a shared regional language, let alone a global one, runs into the fact that language constitutes a key element of the identity, bonds, history, and culture of many existing communities, whether national or merely ethnic groups within a nation. This fact is used to oppose a shared language in numerous circumstances.

Far from seeking to embrace a shared language, many national and ethnic communities are deeply committed to protect and even promote their particularistic tongue. Thus, since the 1970's many of the Bretons of France have sought to revive their native language; they view Breton as an important element of the culture of the Brittany region that has been endangered due to French linguistic hegemony⁸. Endeavors to promote Catalan in the four Spanish provinces and French in Quebec further exemplify efforts to preserve identity by protecting a particularistic language from a more widely shared one. Opposition to English is especially strong as it is associated with American military and cultural imperialism.

In short, although the merits of a shared language can be readily outlined, the sociological and communitarian foundations of the opposition are at least equally strong. Hence the quest for a shared language best take, and has taken, a rather different course.

Particularism and Universalism
It is a serious sociological misunderstanding to assume that people are either dominated by local, particularistic values or by universal ones, such as those encased in the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is best to consider a society as a community of communities, not one that holds X millions individuals, as a two or multiple tier social structure⁹. The said integration is achieved by dividing loyalties and identifications between those where more encompassing entities takes precedence (e.g. the nation, in most matters concerning relations with other nations) versus those in which the smaller communities govern (for instance, in the US, a good part of the curriculum of a given school). There are considerable variations in the ways national and local communities share people's commitments and affections, but most if not all societies have at least two layers of such commitments.

This model of a two-tier structure, of layered loyalties and identities, the combination of local and cosmopolitan culture, provides a model for a global language that will have many of the benefits of such a tongue and be much less damaging to the extant constitutive role of language to particularistic communities. Following such a societal design one would seek not to replace particularistic languages that are constitutive of various communities, but add a universal language to them, a second language that all would share. For instance, the French could continue to study and speak French as the "mother" tongue, enjoy all the subtleties of its literature, particular imagery, nuances, and identity-affirming content. However, when communicating with members of other societies, they would draw on one and the same shared language. (To put it differently, the model of layered loyalties and identities views the global language as additive, rather than as a language that would replace particularistic ones. These particularistic languages serve constitutive roles in communities; seeking to displace these languages would be subtractive¹⁰). This approach may seem very plausible, even self evident, until one notes that it requires that the second language taught and used by all nations would have to be one and the same one. If this development is to take place, it would require a major change in public policies of many nations, we shall see shortly.

English: The de facto lingua terra
Which language would best serve as the second, global language? In effect, this decision has already been made, although not as a result of any meeting of any deliberative body. As is well known, English has become de facto the global language, although numerous nations still resist its use - often because they conflate protection of their primary language with a need to reject a shared secondary one. The fact that English has not been recognized as the said global language is highlighted by the fact that although members of the EU very often communicate with one another in English¹¹, they not only maintain the use of 23 primary, particularistic languages but have not agreed on a secondary one. Thus in 2002, the heads of state or governments at the Barcelona European Council called for "a sustained effort to improve the mastery of basic skills, in particular by teaching at least two foreign languages from a very early age"¹². Any two.

One may say that Chinese is in actuality the language more people speak than English, and hence it is the proper terra lingua. However, we are looking not for the largest number of people who speak to other members of their nation or civilization with a particular language, but the number of those who use a given language to communicate across borders and cultures. Here English - whether desired or not - has reached a level that makes it difficult to image how it could be replaced¹³. Nearly a quarter of the world's population (between 1.2 and 1.5 billion people) are fluent or competent in English¹⁴. An article entitled, "The new Latin: English dominates in academe" reports:

Ninety-five percent of the 925,000 scientific articles published in thousands of major periodicals in 1997 were written in English, according to Eugene Garfield, founder of the Science Citation Index, which tracks science publications. But only half of the English articles originated in English-speaking countries. The trend toward publishing in English began after World War II and has accelerated over the past 20 years¹⁵.

Increasingly multinational corporations and comparatively smaller companies with a global clientele increasingly use English as their working language. Among the companies that participate in this trend are French luxury goods' LVMH Mo‘t Hennessy Louis Vuitton and Italian appliance maker Indesit Company (formerly Merloni Elettrodomestici). European aircraft manufacturer Airbus' working language has been English since it was established¹⁶. The German postal service, Deutsche Post World Net, is increasingly using English as its working language.

Thus, de facto English has established itself as the global language, as the second language for many nationalities, who maintain their primary "mother" tongue.

Policy implications
To review our discussion up to this point, before turning to its policy implications: (a) Instead of trying to find one language that all people will adopt, the world is leaning toward maintaining various national and ethnic languages and using English as second language for cross national communications. This combination allows nurturing local cultures as well as the flourishing of the international realm. (b) The choice of English has economic and cultural benefits for nations whose citizens speak English as their first language. These can be countered to some extent but not eliminated. (c) Accepting the remaining tilt seems preferable compared to the alternatives of having no shared language or trying to institute a universal primary language.

The question hence arises what are the implications of the preceding analysis for policy-makers. Clearly which languages are taught in a given school system, can be used to communicate with public authorities, are recognized as the basis of treaties and other legal documents, are employed on a variety of communication devices from street signs to ballots, are all subject to public policy. Public policy hence plays a key role in determining whether the development of a global language is accelerated or slowed down.

For instance, in Quebec the provincial government attempted to erode the use of English and promote French forcefully with the Charter of the French Language. Amongst other rules, this 1977 law required commercial signs in French to replace multilingual signs in English and French, as well as English-only signs. The Canadian government defended this bill before the Supreme Court of Canada¹⁷ and the UN Human Rights Committee¹⁸. Ultimately, a compromise resulted where both English and French were permitted, though the French must be markedly predominant¹⁹. The Office quêbêcois de la langue française continues to take its mission to ensure that "French is the normal and everyday language of work, communication, commerce and business in the civil administration and in enterprises²⁰." The Office threatened lawsuits against toy and video game makers (Sony and Nintendo) for not meeting French standards for game instructions and product packaging²¹.

The EU has not come to terms with this issue. As already noted it continues to use 23 languages in its official business, but also while it is urging that all students learn a second language (introduced in 2002) - it leaves it up to each school system, what that language is going to be²².

Assuming for the sake of the argument that most people, under most circumstances find it difficult to learn become fluent in a second language, let a alone a third one, what policy implications follow?
i. Policies that promote merely primary languages and actively agitate against the learning of English²³ (as distinct from seeking to limit the intrusion of English terms), hinder most the development of English as a global language (EGL). The kind of policies pursued by Quebec already cited, are a case in point.
ii. Policies that encourage students to learn languages other than English as the second, and even third language, say Russian in Eastern Europe, are similarly detrimental.
iii. Policies that merely encourage students and citizens to learn additional languages, but not one and the same second language hinder the development of EGL. This policy, we have seen, is officially embraced by the EU. (I write officially because practically English is by far the most common second language taught in EU) ²⁴.
iv. Policies that mandate the study of English as the second language are the most productive ones. Colombia, Chile, and Mongolia have committed to becoming mother tongue-English bilingual. They aim to achieve this goal by specific during the next decade²⁵.

In conclusion
One can maintain the particularistic benefits of a communal language and still command a global one, as long as one does not try to replace the primary languages with a universal one but instead draws on the global tongue as a second language. However to advance this goal, a key element of building a global community on top of the local ones, requires that the various nations involved choose the same second language. Although theoretically what language this second one is going to be could be determined by a consultation among the nations of the world, in effect English occupies this position. Public policies in many nations that promote second languages but not the same one because of their opposition to English (often conflating preventing English penetration into the primary language with resisting it as the second tongue). They thus delay overcoming the babble effect at great cost to global laws, shared understandings, and economic transactions. Their policies would be less detrimental if most people, most of the time, could readily acquire English as a third or fourth language. However gaining fluency in a language is difficult under most conditions. Hence the importance of choosing English as the second language while protecting the primary ones.

1 In fact, sharing a global, common language may promote bilateral trade. See, Hyejin Ku and Asaf Zussman "Lingua Franca: the Role of the English Language in Promoting International Trade" September 22, 2006, http://www.arts.cornell.edu/econ/azussman/english.pdf (accessed 27 October 2006).
2 Ernst Apeltauer, "Multilingualism in a Society of the Future?" trans. Gisela Shaw European Journal of Education 28, No 3, (1993): p. 281.
3 Romanian, Bulgarian, and Gaelic will be added as official languages. John Tagliabue "Soon, Europe Will Speak in 23 Tongues," New York Times, 6 December 2006, A-10; "EUROPA - Languages." from EUROPA: Gateway to the European Union, http://europa.eu.int/languages/en/home (accessed 26 January 2006).
4 Key Data on Teaching Languages at School in Europe (Brussels: the Eurydice European Unit , 2004), p. 3, available online at http://www.eurydice.org/ressources/eurydice/pdf/0_integral/049EN.pdf (accessed 11 December 2006).
5 Tagliabue, "Soon, Europe Will Speak in 23 Tongues," p. A-10.
6 Hanspeter K. Scheller, the European Central Bank: History, Role, and Functions (Frankfurt am Main: European Central Bank, 2004), pp. 136-137.
7 Ralph Atkins and Javier Blas "European Central Bank's Coded Nuances Prove a Linguistic Challenge" The Financial Times, 30 September 2006, p. 7.
8 Selma K. Sonntag, The Local Politics of Global English: Case Studies in Linguistic Globalization (New York: Lexington Books, 2003), pp. 45-52.
9 Amitai Etzioni, The New Golden Rule: Community and Morality in a Democratic Society (New York: Basic Books, 1996), Chapter 7.
10 On this point, see Simone Wojtowicz, "The Role of Literacy in Second and Third Language Acquisition" Proceedings of the CATESOL State Conference, 2006, p. 4, available online at http://www.catesol.org/Wojtowicz.pdf (accessed 11 December 2006); Wallace E. Lambert, "Bilingualism and language acquisition," in Native language and foreign language acquisition, ed. Harris Winitz (New York: New York Academy of Sciences, 1981), pp. 9-22.
11 Tagliabue, "Soon, Europe Will Speak in 23 Tongues," A-10.
12 Key Data, p. 3.
13 "....English has at last become of age as a global language. It is a phenomenon which lies at the heart of globalization: English is now redefining national and individual identities worldwide; shifting political fault lines; creating new global patterns of wealth and social exclusion; and suggesting new notions of human rights and responsibilities of citizenship." Graddol English Next, p. 12.
14 David Crystal, English as a Global Language. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), pp. 4-6.
15 Burton Bollag, "The new Latin: English dominates in academe" The Chronicle of Higher Education, 8 September 2000, p. A-73.
16 John Tagliabue "In Europe, Steps Toward a Common Language", The New York Times, 19 July 19 1998, p. D-1; John Tagliabue "In Europe, Going Global Means, Alas, English", The New York Times, 19 May 2002, p. A-15.
17 Ford v. Quebec [1988] S.C.R. 712 (Can.).
18 Ballantyne, Davidson and McIntyre v. Canada, HRC 47th Sess., Communications Nos. 359/1989 and 385/1989, U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/47/D/359/1989 and 385/1989/Rev.1 (1993).
19 "Language Laws in Quebec" CBC News Online, 30 March 2005, http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/bill101/ (accessed 9 December 2006).
20 "Charter of the French Language, Title III, Chapter II" Office quŽbŽcois de la langue fran�aise http://www.olf.gouv.qc.ca/english/charter/title3chapter2.html (accessed 5 December 2006).
21 "Nintendo, Sony could face Quebec law suit" CBC News, 10 November 2000 http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/1999/12/10/pokemon991210.html (accessed 5 December 2006).
22 Key Data, p. 23.
23 Some view English as the language of imperialism, for an overview of promoters of this perspective see Robert Phillipson, Linguistic Imperialism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), pp. 35-37.
24 Key Data, p. 11.
25 Graddol, English Next, p. 89, 95; James Brooke, "For Mongolians, E Is for English, and F Is for the Future," New York Times, 15 February 2005, p. A-7.