French, as an international Language

As a member of the French as a Foreign Language Center, one of the missions of the French Language Institute (ILF) is to promote the teaching of the French Language in France. French language replaced Latin as an international language in the seventeenth century before leaving this place to the English language since the end of the Second World War. In 1685, Pierre Bayle wrote that French is "the communication point of all the European people". The main cause of the French hegemony lies in the power of the French state at this time. On March 6, 1714, the Treaty of Radstadt marking the end of the Spanish Succession War has been written only in French. French remained the international language until 1919. Georges Clemenceau accepted the Treaty of Versailles ending the First World War to be written in French and English. Since, English is gaining more and more speakers against French. In the early twenty-first century, the French still retains many of its prerogatives. If international bodies can accept more than one language, one language must be the language of reference in case of conflict. In this area, French shows some resistance.

For instance, the attempt to impose English instead of French as a reference language in the International Olympic Committee has been dismissed. The Rule 24 of the Olympic charter still says: "The IOC's official languages are French and English. (...) In case of divergence between the French and English texts in the Olympic Charter and other IOC document, the French text shall prevail unless expressly written opposition.There are even international organizations where the only official language remains French: the Universal Postal Union in particular. However, English is clearly preferred by scientific publications or for UN's speeches. In the EU, the dominance of French is also eroding.

If French can maintain its institutional positions, its daily use as a working language is declining since 1919 but nevertheless, the number of speakers has increased since 80's and forecasts show that French speakers could even exceed the number of English speakers in the 2030s. In 2050, it is expected that the number of French speakers represents 8% of the world population while English speakers will represent only 5%.

French as a Foreign Language

It is also the language growing the fastest across the African continent (as an official or foreign language). French is taught in many universities around the world and it has a particular influence in diplomatic, journalistic, legal and academic communities. French is the second most taught foreign language in schools in the European Union (Spanish for instance is far away behind ranked at the fourth place). With the entry of Romania and Bulgaria into the EU since January 2007, French came back in front of German as the foreign language the most taught in the Union, after English. In general, French is one of the most widely taught languages in the world. Because of the particular case of a large Hispanic bloc language in Latin America, the only continent where there are significant Spanish language (except Spain itself), the United States is the only major English-speaking country in the world where French is not the first foreign language taught (Spanish is beating French as the most taught language in the US since the 80). In the other English speaking countries (Ireland, English Canada, etc.), French keeps the distinction of being the first foreign language taught and far ahead of other languages.

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