CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2011
| Author | Győry, Adrienn |
|---|---|
| Title | The Slovak State Language Law and the Accomodation of Minority Rights: The Impact of International Organizations on the Resolution of Language Disputes |
| Summary | During the 1990s the protection of minorities went through a serious development due to the growing concerns of international organizations. In the pre-accession period the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the Council of Europe and later the European Union (EU) sought the resolution of the minority issues in developing institutional accommodation of diversity in the associating states. The main expectation was, that adoption of basic human and minority rights norms would result norm-conforming behavior and the ethnic conflicts be gradually resolved by the application of the endorsed minority rights norms and democratic conciliation. In Slovakia the adoption of the Law on the State Language of the Slovak Republic in 1995 generated a lengthy language dispute. The law intended to strengthen the status of the state language. However, it had considerable impact on the linguistic rights of persons belonging to national minorities. The dispute was resolved in 1999 by passing the Law on Use of Languages of National Minorities. The adoption of the law required the involvement of the Council of Europe, the High Commissioner on National Minorities of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the European Union. In 2009 the Law on the State Language was amended, which – as previously – introduced restrictions on the use of minority languages as well. Thus, the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities became engaged in the dispute of the amended language law. Furthermore, the Council of Europe’s Commission for Democracy through Law was requested to investigate the law’s compliance with international standards. This thesis is devoted to analyze the two language laws and the influence of the above mentioned international organizations on the formation of minority policies in Slovakia by comparing the pre- and post-accession period. The comparative analysis contributes to the study on the integration of post-communist member states into the European international organizations and the impact of external pressure on the institutionalization of minority rights. |
| Supervisor | Pap, András László |
| Department | Nationalism Studies MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2011/gyory_adrienn.pdf |
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