Algunes reflexions sobre les intervencions lingüístiques públiques constrictives en el sector privat a propòsit del capítol V de la Llei 1/1998, de 7 de gener, de política lingüística

Resum

This paper deals with the legitimacy of public language intervention that has a constraining nature in the private sector. The author begins with a brief historical survey of public sector language intervention, in which he observes that the meaning of the official status of languages has shifted: official status is not a mere requisite for the rule of law anymore, but a way to protect citizens' language rights. After this survey, the author focuses on comparative language law in order to analyse the language measures that restrict individual rights and freedoms in democratic states. Drawing on Swiss, Canadian, and French experience, the author concludes that provisions that compel the use of a given language in the private sector are legitimate if their goal is to safeguard that language and if the use of other languages is not prohibited. Bearing these conclusions in mind, the author examines Chapter V of Act 1/1998 on language policy. The principle of language availability would not have been legitimate, but the provisions regarding the use of Catalan in the private sector that appear in the Act's text are, since they do not exclude the use of other languages. To conclude, the author makes some critical remarks about this part of Act 1/1998. According to him, a distinction between big and small "establishments open to the public" would have favoured the imposition of Catalan on the non-permanent signs of the former (not just on the permanent ones). Futhermore, the Act lacks legal categories that would have been adequate, such as granting of public property of universal service. Finally, it would have been advisable to define the services affected by the Act's provisions with greater precision.