• How many countries have a language law, and what does it regulate?

• What languages are used as language of instruction in higher education, and what is their legal basis? 

• What languages are used on company websites? 

• Which countries have specific programs to support language technology for their languages, what do they contain, and where can you find them? 

You can browse and compare language laws, find information about the status of minority languages, the use of languages in the media and much more. Information is displayed in tables and maps.

The focus is on official regulations and their implementation. We have taken great care to provide comments, quotes, links and translations of legislation wherever possible. The data for ELM is collected every 4 years since 2009. 

Target groups of the ELM are primarily policy makers at the national and the European level, linguists, sociologists, publishers, journalists, and other persons who are involved or interested in language development and language policy.

How are the data in ELM collected?

ELM based on a questionnaire which has been filled out by the official institutions of language of each country associated in the European Federation for Institutions of National Languages (EFNIL). The answers contain quantitative and qualitative data such as quotes from legislative texts and other texts in the original language and their translation into English.

ELM contains answers to questions on language planning and language policy divided into 9 main topics:

• General questions about each country and its languages

• Specific legal regulations

• Instruction in and use of languages in primary and secondary education

• Instruction in and use of languages at university level

• Language use in the media

• Language use in business

• Dissemination of official languages abroad

• Language organisations

• Policies for language technology (only in ELM 4 2019)

Although a core of data types will have to be kept constant to allow comparisons and the description of changes, some questions of the repeated surveys are adapted to the changing needs of the users.

Countries covered

ELM 2 covers 23 countries, ELM 3 covers 27, and ELM 4 covers 21 countries. In many cases it is possible to follow the development of language policies and practices in a country for 10 years.

Direct access to ELM

• ELM 4 (2019) (database online)

• ELM 3 (2014) (database online)