Language and Power – An Insight into the Regulatory Framework and Practice of Language Arrangements of the Council of the European Union

The intrinsic nature of language-power relationships has long attracted wide scholarly attention, particularly from the 1980s onwards. In addition to being assigned a classic communication function, language is also seen as a vital tool for demonstrating and exercising political power, that is, a collective power of ethnopolitical communities. This paper looks into the specificities of the language policies of the Council of the European Union both codified and customary, which demonstrate power relations between the Member States of the European Union. The research is based on the legal-dogmatic method as it assesses current positive law, doctrine, concepts, practice, and scholarly literature addressing elements of language arrangements pertinent to the Council. Special emphasis is put on discrepancies between codified rules calling for equality of all EU languages and nurturing linguistic diversity, on the one hand, and daily practices endorsing linguistic imperialism, on the other hand. The paper examines the evolution of language narratives in the founding treaties of the European Union, Council Regulation No. 1/58 determining the languages to be used by the European Union, the Council's Rules of Procedure, and other relevant documents, and compares them with European realities on the ground. Although the regulatory framework governing the work of the Council is more or less clear regarding the equality of the Member States and their official languages, the power gap and language disbalance remain an ever-present element of the EU environment.