By Tore Janson

 

French secured a position as an international language in the seventeenth century, as has been mentioned above. This had much to do with the cultural and political strength of France, especially during the long reign of Louis XIV (1643–1715). France remained very influential throughout the eighteenth century, but it lost much of its political power as a result of the Napoleonic wars. Since 1815, France has still been a significant country in Europe, but it is no longer outstanding.

 

All the same, French kept much of its status as the preferred international language for a long time. It remained the language of diplomacy throughout the nineteenth century and some way into the twentieth. When international postal services on a regular basis were introduced in the nineteenth century, French became the common postal language. It also kept a strong position as a language of science.

French met with competition in Europe, however, first from German. After the unification of Germany under Prussia and the French–German war of the early 1870s, Germany was the politically dominating power for a number of decades. At the same time, the country advanced fast in the fields of technology and science. It became desirable to know German, primarily in the adjacent smaller countries but also to some extent in the other large European countries and in the United States.

 

However, Germany did not remain on top long enough for German to obtain high international status. After the two world wars Germany had lost all political influence, and most of its edge in technology and science. It is true that the country recovered swiftly, but that has not resulted in a leading part on the international stage.

Those parts were reserved for the winners of the Second World War, the United States and the Soviet Union. From 1945 to 1990, the world was dominated by their military might, their rivalry, and their aspirations to power. During the same period the world economy was booming, as well as world population. Education expanded everywhere, and so did international exchange of many kinds.

 

English and Russian, the languages of the two superpowers, naturally profited from this situation. English had a comfortable lead from the start, as will be discussed presently. However, Russian advanced rapidly for several decades. It became the first foreign language in school education in many countries belonging to the Russian sphere of influence, and it grew important in technology and science. The Soviet Union also insisted that Russian should be used as much as possible in diplomatic relations and in international co-operation. Around 1980 it seemed reasonable to believe that the world was being split into two main linguistic spheres, one using English as its common language and the other using Russian.

 

However, when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990 Russian lost its international standing at an amazing speed. In eastern Europe and in other parts of the world where it was a foreign language in schools it is mostly not taught any more. Russia lags far behind in technology and science, and important new results are hardly published in Russian nowadays. At present, Russian may possibly compete with French or Spanish on an international ranking list of languages. English, on the other hand, has a privileged position as the preferred international language, without any serious competition at present. The reasons can be found in a number of historical developments that have all been to the advantage of the English language.