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The Language Service of the General Secretariat of The QC-32-11-696-EN-C EN Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat 175 1048 Bruxelles/Brussel BELGIQUE/BELGIË Tel. +32 22816111 THE LANGUAGE SERVICE OF GENER AL SECRETARIAT THE COUNCIL OF www.consilium.europa.eu THE GENERAL SECRETARIAT OF THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Making Multilingualism Work doi:10.2860/79193 INFORMATION SERIES RS 15/2012 FEBRUARY 2012 Notice General Secretariat of the Council This brochure is produced by the General Secretariat of the Council THE LANGUAGE SERVICE OF THE GENERAL SECRETARIAT OF THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Directorate-General A - Personnel and Administration Making Multilingualism Work Directorate 3 - Translation and Document Production. 2012 — 23 p. — 14,8 x 21cm This brochure is for information purposes only. ISBN 978-92-824-2929-7 For any information on the European Council and the Council, you can consult the following websites: doi:10.2860/79193 www.european-council.europa.eu www.consilium.europa.eu or contact the Public Information Department of the General Secretariat of the Council at the following address: Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat 175 Tel: +32 22815650 1048 Bruxelles/Brussel Fax: +32 22814977 BELGIQUE/BELGIË www.consilium.europa.eu/infopublic More information on the European Union is available on the Internet (http://europa.eu). Cataloguing data can be found at the end of this publication. ISBN 978-92-824-2929-7 doi:10.2860/79193 © European Union, 2012 Reproduction is authorised provided the source is acknowledged. Printed in Belgium Cover: © Helder Almeida - Fotolia.com 1 THE LANGUAGE SERVICE OF THE GENERAL SECRETARIAT OF THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION Making Multilingualism Work The Lex Building, where the Council's Language Service is situated INTRODUCTION 3 Welcome to the Language Service of the Council of the European Union! With 23 official languages1, the European Union (EU) is by far the most multilingual organisation in the world. This multilingualism reflects Europe's linguistic diversity and the political necessity for the EU institutions to embrace that diversity as an operational principle, but it also poses a serious practical challenge. The Language Service of the General Secretariat of the Council of the EU (GSC) helps to overcome this challenge: by providing high-quality translations for the European Council and the Council of the EU, as well as European citizens, it helps to make multilingualism work. Translation activities at the GSC focus on policy documents and legislation. In this brochure you will find further information on these activities at the GSC and on the work of its Language Service. Български – español – čeština – dansk – Deutsch – eesti keel – ελληνικά – English – français – Gaeilge – italiano – latviešu valoda – lietuvių kalba – magyar – Malti – Nederlands – polski – português – română – slovenčina – slovenščina – suomi – svenska 1 Twenty-four when Croatia joins the European Union on 1 July 2013. 4 A MULTILINGUAL FRAMEWORK A MULTILINGUAL UNION With 23 official languages, the EU is by far the most multilingual organisation in the world, and the number of languages looks set to rise with the accession of new Member States over the coming years. The principle of multilingualism was set out in Council Regulation No 1 of 15 April 1958 determining the languages to be used by the then European Economic Community. The 23 current official languages are: Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Irish, Italian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish and Swedish2. European citizens have the right to learn about the EU and to com- municate with it in one of its 23 official languages. In addition, much European legislation is directly applicable throughout all the Member States. For this to work, those laws must be available in the languages of those Member States. This is a fundamental requirement for the democratic legitimacy of a Union with 27 culturally and linguistically diverse Member States. A SERIOUS PRACTICAL CHALLENGE The EU's multilingualism reflects the continent's wealth of cultural and linguistic diversity but it also poses a serious practical challenge. The role of the Language Service is to help to meet this challenge by providing the European Council and the Council of the EU, and ultimately European citizens, with the necessary translations to make multilingualism work. 2 Croatian is to be added to the list when Croatia joins the European Union on 1 July 2013. THE INSTITUTIONAL STRUCTURE 5 TWO INSTITUTIONS The General Secretariat serves two different institutions: the European Council and the Council of the EU. Each is a fully-fledged institution in its own right, but closely related to the other. The European Council defines the general political guidelines of the European Union. The Council of the European Union has legislative and budgetary functions, as well as policy making and coordinating functions. THE EUROPEAN COUNCIL Established as an independent institution by the Lisbon Treaty (2007), the European Council consists of the Heads of State or Government of the EU Member States, together with its President and the President of the Commission. The High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy also participates. The full- time President of the European Council is elected for a period of two and a half years, renewable once. The European Council meets at least four times a year and attracts a lot of media atten- Which language version? The Language Service supports negotiations in the framework of the European Council tion, since its decisions provide by providing documents in all official languages. a major impetus for defining the President Herman Van Rompuy with the German general political guidelines of Chancellor Angela Merkel and the Prime Minister of the European Union. Slovakia, Iveta Radičová. 6 The role of the European Council is to provide the necessary impetus and to define the general political direction and priorities of the EU. It issues important policy statements but does not enact legislation. All major European Council policy statements are translated into the official languages. THE COUNCIL OF THE EU Along with the Parliament, the Council of the EU (sometimes referred to as the Council of Ministers) is a main actor in the discussion and adoption of EU legislation. The members of the Council of the EU represent the Member States. The Council meets much more frequently than the European Council, doing so in various configurations, for example, the "Agriculture and Fisheries Council" or the "Economic and Financial Affairs Council", depending on the subject-matter being discussed. The meetings are attended by one minister from each of the EU's national governments, normally the minister who is responsible for the subject-matter to be addressed. One of the major tasks of the Council is to adopt EU legis- lation, most of which originates as a proposal from the European Commission and is adopted jointly by the Council and the European Parliament under what is called the "ordi- nary legislative procedure". The often substantial amendments made to this legislation as it passes through the Council are translated into the official lan- guages by the Language Service. 7 THE LANGUAGE SERVICE OF THE GENERAL SECRETARIAT OF THE COUNCIL The General Secretariat of the Council (GSC) is the permanent Euro- pean civil service body providing all the necessary advice and support to both the European Council and the Council of the EU. The GSC comprises a total staff of around 3000. The Language Service forms part of Directorate General A3 (Translation and Document Produc- tion) within the GSC and accounts for some 1000 of total GSC staff numbers. The Language Service provides translations into the 23 official -lan guages of all major policy documents and of almost all legislation at certain key stages of the legislative procedure. In this way, all involved parties, from key players to the general public, have access to the main documents and legislation of the EU in the official languages. The Language Service also provides translations for other EU bodies (in particular the European External Action Service - EEAS), transla- tions intended for more general communication with the public and for the GSC's numerous Working Parties, and translations to meet its own internal administrative needs. Also, it occasionally provides translations from and into other, non-official languages. However, the Language Service does not provide interpreting (oral) services. For interpreting, the GSC draws on the interpreting services of the European Commission. 8 THE LANGUAGE SERVICE: A MULTILINGUAL TEAM TRANSLATION — FACTS AND FIGURES The Language Service of the GSC translates more than 13 000 docu- ments per year, which results in a total output of around one million pages per year, all languages included. Almost all legislation and many major policy documents are translated into all 23 official EU languages. However, for efficiency's sake, many other documents are not translated at all or are only translated into a limited number of languages. In fact about 70 % of the total pages produced for the Council are not translated at all since, for practical purposes, most of the Working Parties work on the basis of a text drafted in a single language. The Language Service comprises some 650 translators and 250 sup- port staff working day and, if need be, night, in order to have all the requested translations ready in time. They are divided into 23 differ- ent language units, one for each official language (plus a 24th being established for Croatian). In addition to the language units, the Language Service has its own management team to give guidance, foster best practices and ensure communication and cohesion across the language units. To this end, it is supported by a CAT Tools Coordinator, a Quality Policy Coordi- nator, Terminology and Documentation Coordinators, and a Project Coordinator. The Service also includes a language library with reference material in all 23 official languages.
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