Plain language

The Insititute for the Languages of Finland conducts research on EU Finnish from various angles in order to provide information basis for its plain language work and for authorities and translators. Among the investigated topics are attitudes towards and perceptions of EU Finnish, the process of transposition and the morphology, phraseology and vocabulary of EU Finnish.

Attitudes and perceptions

Two surveys on the Finnish officials’ use of languages in EU working groups and their perceptions of Finnish used in EU legislation and other texts were conducted in 1998 and 2006-2007.

Comparisons of EU Finnish and national language of law

The Institute for the Languages of Finland compiled a small corpus in 2003–2006 of laws enacted from government bills to implement Directives, and of the associated Directives. The corpus has been structured and morphologically analyzed.  A comparison of grammatical forms revealed few but telling differences between the usage of national and EU Finnish. The corpus was also used to locate citations from directives to Finnish laws by using identical or very similar n-grams. It turned out that most multiple-word citations were modified by the Finnish legal drafters, who adjusted the borrowed text to requirements of Finnish legal style.

Read articles based on the Institute's corpus:

Eurolect Observatory

The Eurolect Observatory Project was set up in 2013 to investigate the existence of eurolects, separate varieties of legal language in nine languages: Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Italian, Polish, Spanish, Eurolects. Its research material was a parallel corpus of over 600 directives and corresponding national laws in each of the participating languages. The Institute for the Languages of Finland is a part of the Finnish team.

This book (first published 2006) contains articles that explore the position and usage of Finnish in the EU since Finland became a member in 1995. Also reviewed are the plans for improving the regulatory quality and bringing clarity to the communication of the union. The articles are written in Finnish but English summaries are available.

The entire text in Finnish:

Summaries in English

Kaisa Koskinen: Finnish Translation in the European Commission

This article provides an overview of how Finnish translation in the European Union institutions, the European Commission in particular, has evolved during the past ten years. It looks at how we have dealt with the newly won status of Finnish as an international language, how translation strategies have developed, how the (Finnish) translators perceive their role within the institution – and how they are perceived by others. It also discusses the effects of computerization and the increasing demands for efficiency and productivity in administration.

Finland’s entry into the European Union 1995 propelled the Finnish language into a status of an international language. Language and translation policies needed to be decided on a very pragmatic level: how to recruit translators and interpreters; what translation strategies to adopt; whether the Finnish politicians were to use their own language or a lingua franca, typically English. These questions still remain. Now that many translators have worked in the EU institutions for a decade, translation activity has been “normalized”, but there seems to be room for improvement. In interviews I found that the Finnish translators feel like “a necessary evil”, and they are both mentally and physically detached from the drafting processes and their role is often forgotten. This can easily be verified in recent high-level texts concerning the EU’s democratic deficit and lack of popular support: in these documents, communication has a central role, but translators and interpreters are not even mentioned although it is mainly through them that the EU communicates.

Marianna Sunnari: Finland and Finnish in the multilingual European Union

We live in a multilingual world. In international cooperation, we can either use one language or adopt a number of official languages. French was the language of international relations for about three hundred years till the end of the First World War, when English was adopted as the second official language of the Paris Peace Conference in 1919.

The European Union is the only international organization where the languages of all member states have the status of an official language. This was established in the very first regulation (amended after each enlargement) adopted by the Council of Ministers in 1958. The Regulation makes it clear that the member states themselves decide which languages should be the official and working languages of the institutions. The Treaties also lay down the principle of multilingualism and state that every citizen of the Union may write to any of the institutions or bodies in one of the official languages and receive an answer in the same language.

In practice, the right to use one’s own language is guaranteed through translation and interpretation, although these are not explicitly referred to in any of the above documents.

Today, however, the language arrangements of EU meetings vary considerably, depending on the status of the meeting, the requirements of the delegates, and resources available. This involves a balancing act between the principles of equality, respect for diversity and democracy, and the need for efficiency. Especially in internal communication, English and French continue to be the main languages, while the dominance of English seems to be growing as it is the most common option if a member state cannot use its own language. Finnish is one the languages which has been affected by the changes introduced over the last ten years. While flexibility is necessary, we need to ensure that Finnish continues to be used as a means of communication in all spheres of life – unless we are willing to return to a situation where only one language can serve as an instrument of international co-operation.

Anu Sajavaara: Clarifying eurolanguage - seeing through the fog? EU milestones towards better regulation

Simplification of legislation is a relatively new issue on the European Union agenda. The first half-hearted attempts were made in the early 1990s, but it was not until the 2000s that better regulation became one of the key priorities in European decision-making. The fate of the Constititutional Treaty following the referenda in France and the Netherlands, growing euroscepticism, and democracy deficiency have made it necessary for the European Union institutions to bring the European Union closer to its citizens. One way to accomplish this is to regulate less and smarter.

Important milestones on the long road towards better regulation are the Interinstitutional agreement on better lawmaking (2003) and the Joint practical guide for legal drafters (2000). In 2002 the Commission presented an Action Plan on “Simplifying and improving the regulatory environment”. Fight the Fog, a campaign launched by the Commission translators, and two attempts to rewrite European legislation to meet the requirements of what is called plain language called public attention to attempts at improving the quality of European legislation. Unfortunately, the language and style aspects of legislation and other European regulations have become less important in recent years in the regulation process.

Inkaliisa Vihonen: From regulation to communication, EU plain language efforts from 2005 onwards

In the European context the need to simplify and clarify is most often associated with legal language. The constitutional crisis following the rejection of the draft European Constitution by French and Dutch voters in 2005 brought up the need to communicate European affairs to EU citizens instead of prescribing them by law. Simplification of non-legal texts does not, however, follow the same rules as legislative simplification. To deal with this new prerequisite, the European Commission has come up with several action plans to improve its communication policies.

The Commission’s simplifications plans from 2005 onwards have underlined the importance of communicating with the EU citizens in a language familiar and comprehensible to them. The EU officials are specifically advised to avoid eurojargon because it is confusing, complicated and often elitist. Despite the foreground gained to communication, it is still difficult to disperse the fog in the EU language. The EU is a legal entity and most of its language practices are dominated by the constrains of legal certainty and all-inclusiveness. These practices should, however, be suited to meet the growing demand for comprehensibility and transparency.

The EU’s simplification strategies should also be concretized. Even if all the recent plans mention the need for clarity, they very rarely refer to language as such. In addition, it is not always clear, what is meant by simplification. The plans also lack concrete means to fight the EU fog. Therefore we need European research on the EU language and its comprehensibility. Concrete results in the strive for a clearer EU language are only gained if we are provided with concrete means to work with.

Aino Piehl: Do the Finnish laws begin to resemble EU directives?

This article discusses the possible similarities between the Finnish version of EU directives and Finnish laws drafted to implement such directives. It focuses on features which are thought to correlate with clarity and comprehensibility and which can be compared statistically. These features include e.g. the length of sentences and clauses, the number of clauses per sentence, the type of subordinate clauses and the number of nominalizations, including clause equivalents, participial modifiers and other expressions replacing subordinate clauses.

The European Union’s impact on the Finnish language has been a focus of debate since the country became a member ten years ago. According to a survey conducted in 1998 among Finnish officials, EU regulations in Finnish were harder to understand than Finnish regulations. The idea that the language used by public authorities – legal language included – should be comprehensible to most citizens has been firmly rooted in Finnish society. In practice the legal texts often fail to meet this ideal, and their shortcomings have often been traced to EU directives.

This comparative analysis of EU directives and their Finnish implementing laws suggests that the former have not affected the syntax of Finnish legal discourse, which remains consistent with developments first observed in the 1980s. Finnish legislation is moving towards shorter sentences with fewer clauses. On the other hand, the changes in legal texts have not only been positive, especially in terms of comprehensiblity: participial modifiers and other nominalizations eventually lessen the number of verbs expressing activity.

Many legal experts still think that the Finnish statutes do show an influence. Several individual cases have shown that wordings of the directives are transferred untouched to the Finnish implementing laws. Preventing the increase of obscure expressions in Finnish legal language calls for measures on both national and community level: the unintended obscurities should be cleared before the directive is adopted or, at the latest, when the directive is implemented. The member states should seriously reflect on their role in promoting good quality of language while drafting the community legislation. They should also consider the  possibilities of multilingualism in enhancing comprehensibility.

Hanna Westerlund: Compounds as potential equivalents in translating EU regulations into Finnish

A translator working on the European Union regulations needs to make several terminological choices on the translation variants for each translation unit. These choices are governed by a number of affecting factors but ultimately the decision of how to transfer a specific concept from the source language to the target language is nevertheless dependent on an overall translation strategy. This article seeks to highlight compounding as a specific lexical choice that the translator has available within every translation strategy.

Compounding can be motivated by need for space saving, or by the lack of terms in the language for specific purposes (LSP) in the target culture. New terms are sometimes coined by combining existing words in the target language to introduce novel concepts into the source culture, sometimes the words are borrowed from the source language either in their orthographic form or via direct translation, and sometimes the meaning of already existing terms in the target culture LSP is widened to enhance new concepts.

The motivation for compounding can be traced to the need of the  multilingual community to be as unified and as consistent as possible in its legal terminology, and where the requirements for good compounding are fulfilled, the compound nouns tend to show good terminological qualities in both consistency and clarity. In cases where the requirements are not met with, the price of the consistency might prove to be poor readability, or increased expectations for readers of the European community legislation to be experts in the legal domain. The length and the heavy premodification of compound nouns might result in growing uncertainty in the readers trying to understand the meaning of a given term. The European community would benefit from clear and consistent legislative language that the citizens of the member states would be able to comprehend.

In 1998 and 2006–7, the Institute for the Languages of Finland (ILF) conducted a survey of Finnish public officials. This survey aimed to gather information on the languages they used in the course of their EU duties. Questions on the perceived quality of EU texts were also presented.

– Finnish public officials mainly use English in EU meetings.

– In their opinion, there is often room for improvement in Finnish versions of EU texts.  

– According to the 1998 survey, interpretation from and into Finnish was seldom available. In 2007, around half of respondents felt that their need for interpretation services was inadequately met.

– According to the 2007 survey, around half of the respondents could not say whether they had engaged in sufficient/adequate cooperation with translators.

– In 1998, ILF asked non–native interpreters and translators of Finnish within the EU to list what they found most difficult about Finnish source texts.

– In 1999, ILF prepared a manual for public officials on how to compose speeches and other texts to enable their successful translation or interpretation:

(you move to another service)– This manual encouraged officials to view translation and interpretation as teamwork between the author and translator and/or interpreter. It also provided information on how and where to contact language professionals.

– The Finnish Prime Minister’s Office published and distributed the manual, together with other background material, to all public officials involved in running the Finnish EU Presidencies in 1999 and 2006.

– Prior to the 2006 Presidency, the ILF and interpreters from the European Commission held several presentations to underline the importance of cooperation between public officials and interpreters. As a result, demand for interpretation increased.

– Based on the Finnish booklet, Sweden drew up a similar manual for its own EU Presidency in 2001.

– In 2003, the Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union prepared a corresponding manual in French and English (new editions in 2010).

– Estonia had the manual translated into Estonian in 2007 (Autor, arvesta ka tõlkijat).

– In 2008, the European Commission Directorate–General for Translation presented the Finnish Minister of Justice with a proposal to set up a network for the translation of EU legislation. The aim was to establish a coordinated contact channel for questions and feedback between EU translators and interpreters, and Finnish public officials.

– With the active backing and lobbying of the ILF, the network was set up in 2009. The Finnish Prime Minister’s Office and the European Commission are responsible for coordinating the network’s activities, while the ILF provides the necessary support.

– In 2011, the Advisory Board on Better Regulation issued a report in which it urged the Finnish Government to strengthen the Finnish language’s status in the drafting of EU legislation.

1. Membership in EU put Finnish language in a new situation

The accession of Finland to the European Union was a watershed for the Finnish language, which suddenly became one of the languages of a major international community. It was now possible to speak Finnish at the meetings of this community, and its most important documents were also translated into Finnish. Such extensive use of the Finnish language in the international arena was unprecedented, as was the fact that Finnish officials were now involved in preparing Community statutes drafted in many languages.

2. Why the survey was undertaken and how it was carried out

What is the status of the Finnish language in the multilingual legal drafting process? Does it also influence the language of documents? These questions have been investigated through two surveys: the first in 1998 and the second in summer 2006 (with further research in spring 2007). It should be noted that the findings of these surveys only reflect the views of the respondents, and cannot be generalised to describe the views or behaviour of all public servants.

The survey questionnaire was sent to liaison officials in Finnish government departments for forwarding to staff engaged in European Union functions. These surveys drew responses from 180 officials in 1998. There were 165 respondents in 2006–7. Most of the respondents participated as Finnish delegates in different working groups of the Council.

3. Language use of the Finnish officials in the EU

Despite a gap of nearly a decade between these two surveys, the responses were strikingly similar. They indicate that Finnish officials usually negotiate in English at European Union meetings. This means that they generally work from the English language version of the draft statute and present their own views in English.

At the time of the first survey there were not enough interpreters who were able to interpret from Finnish, but a training program had already been set up. The studies may also reflect this change, insofar as more respondents to the survey of 2006–7 reported that they were also using Finnish at EU meetings.

There was, however, another change in the circumstances. After the Community enlargement of 2004 the arrangements for interpreting were changed to impose a quota on each language. Any Member State choosing to exceed this quota was liable for the additional cost of doing so.

In 2004 only Sweden of all Member States ordered less interpreting than Finland, but requests for such services in 2007 were higher than in the preceding year. Still, half of the respondents complained of not securing interpretation services as often as they would require, while the other half were satisfied with the level of service provided.

4. Why the Finnish officials mostly choose English

The responding officials explain that they often read draft statutes in English, as these versions reach their desks more quickly. The Finnish translations come later, if at all, at this stage of legislative drafting. English is the most common foreign language understood in Finland and elsewhere, and has nowadays become the mutual communication medium of choice for most representatives of the Member States.

Most of the respondents also report that they prefer to read Community documents in English, as this is anyway the language used when these documents are discussed at meetings. Many of them also think that the English version is more accurate that the Finnish version. One consequence of this is that the Finnish translation can easily be downgraded to a minor role in legislative drafting. Finnish tends to be used only in certain situations, for example when reporting progress in EU to Parliament or to other stakeholders in Finland.

5. What the respondents think of the EU texts

The survey highlights the drawbacks of the subordinate role of Finnish as a working language. Many respondents make it quite clear that the Finnish versions of documents seem alien and open to many objections. While just under half of the respondents think that Community documents drafted in foreign languages are obscure, over 80 per cent find the Finnish translations hard to read.

Complex sentence structures, alien phraseology and unknown terminology are most commonly identified as the features that make these documents obscure. On the plus side, however, nearly half of all respondents feel that the quality of documents has improved since they began using them. Half of them also thought that more freedom in translating would improve the Finnish versions.

6. About cooperation between Finnish officials and translators

At least in theory, officials are in a position to influence the Finnish formulation of documents, as the Finnish negotiators review and revise translations prepared by Community institutions. As actively involved parties, these officials know what the document seeks to achieve, whereas the translator often only has the text to work with. This would therefore seem to offer scope for closer co-operation.

More than a quarter of the respondents felt that they had sufficient contact with translators, while a further quarter disagreed with this view. On the other hand, nearly half of the respondents could offer no opinion on this matter. Many comments suggested that there was too little time available for feedback and revision of texts, although this is naturally something that varies considerably by government department and at various times.

7. More attention to the Finnish text version

What conclusions can we draw from these findings? Irrespective of the weight that we assign to the opinions expressed in these surveys, the responses highlight certain points that deserve closer attention.

In the first place, it is worth ensuring that officials work from draft statutes not only in English but also in their native language at the earliest possible stage, and that they are given sufficient time to do so, both by Finnish government departments and by the European Union. Such additional effort would be particularly worthwhile when drafting Regulations, which are in force in every Member State as such without national implementation. “Obviously the most important thing is what the text is in Finnish,” was the observation of one respondent whose views deserve greater prominence.

8. More cooperation with the translators and more Finnish at the meetings

In the second place, care should be taken to facilitate contact between specialist officials and the translators who work at Community institutions, and to ensure that the latter can readily locate the right person at a ministry or elsewhere to answer their questions and the former the right person in the EU institutions to give feedback to. (A network for this end is currently being built.)

Thirdly, it is important to pay attention to the status of one’s native language as a working language: it is more natural to work from a document written in this language at a meeting where one can speak and listen to this language. Perhaps a more systematic distribution of interpretation services could make interpretation available at least at some stages of the legislative drafting process of every statute. As another respondent observed: “I think it’s important to improve the status of the Finnish language. This would make it much easier to lobby for Finnish interests.”

Read more about how the legal language has been developed towards better comprehensibility in the language of law.

Administrative Procedure Act requires that the authorities use appropriate, clear and comprehensible language. The website gives examples of how to comply with this requirement in practice when drafting a statute.