Aino Piehl & Eivor Sommardahl (Institute for the Languages of Finland): Plain language in two official languages – is there an advantage?

Plain language in two official languages – is there an advantage?

Finland has two official languages, Finnish and Swedish. Citizens are entitled to use either one of the two languages with government agencies, and either one or both of them with municipal authorities, depending on whether the municipality is mono- or bilingual (following from the proportion of Finnish and Swedish speaking inhabitants of a municipality). In order to fulfill these obligations, state and municipal authorities must translate a lot of texts into Finnish or Swedish.

It is a well-known fact that translated texts will be more functional and easier to understand if the source texts are of good quality and clear in meaning. But can the translation process also change the source texts for the better and enhance the terminology and names in them? In Finland we have a long experience of the added value translating administrative texts can bring to plain language work. The new Action Plan for clear language in administration by the Finnish Government strives to make the translation process a plain language tool used even more systematically than before.