Most experts on divided societies and institutional design broadly agree that it is more difficult to establish and maintain a stable, functioning democracy in a country with multiple languages and linguistically fragmented public spheres than in more homogeneous countries. Multilingual countries such as Canada and Belgium have been experiencing considerable difficulties in past decades (see the almost successful 1995 referendum on sovereignty in Quebec or the institutional deadlock and the rise of Flemish nationalism in Belgium since the 1970s). The prospects for the EU to become a viable democracy are even more haunted by multilingualism, considering that it has 24 official languages and no lingua franca. Switzerland, however, is also a multilingual country without a lingua franca, fragmented into 22 mono-lingual and three multilingual cantons, as well as into four distinct public spheres (German, French, Italian, Romansh). And yet it is widely seen as one of the most stable and successful democracies. Conventional wisdom in political science literature suggests that "consociational" political institutions account for the success of Swiss multilingual democracy. This book offers a different institutional explanation. The author argues that in mainstream literature important Swiss institutions - in particular direct democracy, Parliament and the federal executive - have largely been misinterpreted: they have been labelled as consociational, whereas they are rather a product of "centripetalism", an approach to institutional design in which political incentives are directed toward intergroup compromise because of the need to appeal to voters across group lines in order to form majorities. This approach to achieving long-term democratic stability stands in sharp contrast to consociationalism.

"Most experts on divided societies and institutional design broadly agree that it is more difficult to establish and maintain a stable, functioning democracy in a country with multiple languages and linguistically fragmented public spheres than in more homogeneous countries. Multilingual countries such as Canada and Belgium have been experiencing considerable difficulties in past decades (see the almost successful 1995 referendum on sovereignty in Quebec or the institutional deadlock and the rise of Flemish nationalism in Belgium since the 1970s). The challenge of multilingualism has been on the rise in the United States, too, considering an ever-increasing number of Spanish speakers who are not fluent in English and the emergence of Spanish-only media in some parts of the country. The prospects for the EU to become a viable democracy are even more haunted by multilingualism, considering that it has 24 official languages and no lingua franca. Switzerland, however, is also a multilingual country without a lingua franca, fragmented into 26 largely mono-lingual cantons and four linguistically distinct public spheres (German, French, Italian, Romansh). And yet it is widely seen as one of the most stable and successful democracies in the contemporary world. This book offers a different institutional explanation that accounts for the success of Swiss multilingual democracy. The author argues that in mainstream literature important Swiss institutions - in particular direct democracy, Parliament and the federal executive - have not been properly understood"--

What role does linguistic diversity play in European democratic and legal processes? Is it an obstacle to deliberative democracy and a hindrance to legal certainty, or a cultural and economic asset and a prerequisite for the free movement of citizens? This book examines the tensions and contradictions of European language laws and policy from a multi-disciplinary perspective. With contributions from leading researchers in EU law and legal theory, political science, sociology, sociolinguistic and cognitive linguistics, it combines mutually exclusive and competing perspectives of linguistic diversity. The work will be a valuable resource for academics and researchers in the areas of European law, legal theory and linguistics.

Aquest llibre aborda dos debats ideològics que determinen posicions actuals sobre la justícia lingüística: l’un, sobre el valor de les llengües com a eines de comunicació i transmissors d’identitat; l'altre, entre visions monistes i pluralistes derivades de concepcions més o menys territorialitzades de grups de llengües.

This book considers the issue of language in the European Union. Without a community of communication, the EU must remain a trading association run in an autocratic way by bilingual patrician technocrats; with a community of communication, the European Union could develop democratic structures and legitimacy and give meaning to its policies of free movement. How to achieve that community of communication is the biggest challenge facing Europe today.