Federal Act
on the National Languages and
Understanding between the Linguistic Communities
(Languages Act, LangA)

This Act reg­u­lates:

a.

the use of the of­fi­cial lan­guages by the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies and in deal­ings with them;

b.

the pro­mo­tion of un­der­stand­ing and ex­change between the lin­guist­ic com­munit­ies;

c.

sup­port for the pluri­lin­gual can­tons in ful­filling their spe­cif­ic tasks;

d.

sup­port for meas­ures by the can­tons of Graubünden and Ti­cino that be­ne­fit Ro­man­sh and Itali­an.

By means of this Act, the Con­fed­er­a­tion in­tends:

a.

to strengthen quad­ri­lin­gual­ism as one of Switzer­land's fun­da­ment­al char­ac­ter­ist­ics;

b.

to con­sol­id­ate the in­tern­al co­he­sion of the coun­try;

c.

to en­cour­age in­di­vidu­al and in­sti­tu­tion­al pluri­lin­gual­ism in the na­tion­al lan­guages;

d.

to pre­serve and pro­mote Ro­man­sh and Itali­an as na­tion­al lan­guages.

¹ In ful­filling its tasks, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall ob­serve the fol­low­ing prin­ciples in par­tic­u­lar:

a.

it shall en­sure that it treats the four na­tion­al Swiss lan­guages equally;

b.

it shall guar­an­tee and ap­ply lin­guist­ic free­dom in all its areas of activ­ity;

c.

it shall take ac­count of the tra­di­tion­al lin­guist­ic com­pos­i­tion of Switzer­land's re­gions;

d.

it shall pro­mote un­der­stand­ing between the lin­guist­ic com­munit­ies.

² It shall work with the can­tons to ful­fil its tasks re­lat­ing to the policy on lan­guages and un­der­stand­ing between the lin­guist­ic com­munit­ies.

¹ This sec­tion ap­plies to the fol­low­ing fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies:

a.

the Fed­er­al As­sembly and its or­gans;

b.

the Fed­er­al Coun­cil;

c.

the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­tra­tion un­der Art­icle 2 para­graphs 1–3 of the Gov­ern­ment and Ad­min­is­tra­tion Or­gan­isa­tion Act of 21 March 1997⁴ (GAOO);

d.

the fed­er­al courts;

e.

the ex­tra-par­lia­ment­ary com­mit­tees of the Con­fed­er­a­tion.

² Where the goals set out in this Act so re­quire, the Fed­er­al Coun­cil may provide that:

a.

pro­vi­sions of this Sec­tion ap­ply to or­gan­isa­tions or per­sons un­der Art­icle 2 para­graph 4 GAOO that are en­trus­ted with ad­min­is­trat­ive tasks un­der fed­er­al law;

b.

the grant­ing of li­cences or as­sign­ments and the award of fin­an­cial as­sist­ance are made con­di­tion­al on com­ply­ing with the pro­vi­sions of this Sec­tion.

¹ The of­fi­cial lan­guages of the Con­fed­er­a­tion are Ger­man, French and Itali­an. Ro­man­sh is an of­fi­cial lan­guage in deal­ings with per­sons who speak this lan­guage.

² The fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies shall use the of­fi­cial lan­guages in their stand­ard forms.

¹ Any per­son deal­ing with a fed­er­al au­thor­ity may do so in the of­fi­cial lan­guage of their own choice.

² The fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies shall an­swer in the of­fi­cial lan­guage in which they are ad­dressed. They may agree with per­sons who con­tact them to use a dif­fer­ent of­fi­cial lan­guage.

³ Per­sons who speak Ro­man­sh may ad­dress the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies in its idioms or in Ru­mantsch Grischun. The au­thor­it­ies an­swer in Ru­mantsch Grischun.

⁴ The Fed­er­al Coun­cil may re­strict the free choice of of­fi­cial lan­guage for deal­ings with au­thor­it­ies whose activ­it­ies are lim­ited to a spe­cif­ic re­gion.

⁵ In deal­ings with per­sons who have no com­mand of an of­fi­cial lan­guage, the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies shall if pos­sible use a lan­guage that these per­sons un­der­stand.

⁶ The spe­cial pro­vi­sions on the ad­min­is­tra­tion of fed­er­al justice are re­served.

¹ The fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies shall en­deav­our to en­sure that their lan­guage is ap­pro­pri­ate, clear and com­pre­hens­ible and shall en­sure that gender-ap­pro­pri­ate word­ing is used.

² The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall take the meas­ures re­quired; in par­tic­u­lar, it shall ar­range for the ba­sic and ad­vanced train­ing of em­ploy­ees and the pro­vi­sion of the re­quired aids.⁵

¹ In de­bates in the Fed­er­al As­sembly and its com­mit­tees, each mem­ber shall use a na­tion­al lan­guage of his or her choice.

² Dis­patches, re­ports, draft le­gis­la­tion and re­quests must nor­mally be sub­mit­ted for con­sid­er­a­tion in the Fed­er­al As­sembly and its com­mit­tees in Ger­man, French and Itali­an.

¹ The mem­bers of the Fed­er­al Coun­cil, the Fed­er­al Chan­cel­lor and Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­tra­tion staff shall work as they wish in Ger­man, French or Itali­an.

² Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­tra­tion em­ploy­ers as defined in the le­gis­la­tion on fed­er­al per­son­nel shall make the re­quired aids avail­able.

¹ Fed­er­al en­act­ments and oth­er texts that must be pub­lished of­fi­cially in the Of­fi­cial or Clas­si­fied Com­pil­a­tions of Fed­er­al Le­gis­la­tion or in the Fed­er­al Gaz­ette in terms of the Pub­lic­a­tions Act of 18 June 2004⁶ or based on oth­er fed­er­al law pro­vi­sions shall be pub­lished in Ger­man, French and Itali­an un­less the law provides oth­er­wise.⁷

² Pub­lic­a­tion shall take place sim­ul­tan­eously in Ger­man, French and Itali­an.

Texts of par­tic­u­lar im­port­ance as well as the doc­u­ments for fed­er­al elec­tions and votes shall also be pub­lished in Ro­man­sh. The Fed­er­al Chan­cellery shall de­term­ine which texts are pub­lished after con­sult­ing the Chan­cellery of the Can­ton of Graubünden and the fed­er­al agen­cies con­cerned.

¹ The fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies shall use the loc­al of­fi­cial lan­guage for pub­lic com­mu­nic­a­tions.

² The fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies shall com­mu­nic­ate with the pub­lic in the four of­fi­cial lan­guages, in par­tic­u­lar in the design:

a.

of its prin­ted mat­ter;

b.

of its in­ter­net home pages;

c.

in signs in its build­ings.

³ Per­son­al iden­tity doc­u­ments shall be is­sued in the four of­fi­cial lan­guages.

⁴ Fed­er­al forms in­ten­ded for the gen­er­al pub­lic must be made avail­able in all the of­fi­cial lan­guages. The fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies may al­low ex­cep­tions for forms in­ten­ded for a lim­ited group of per­sons.

¹ An ori­gin­al ver­sion of bi­lat­er­al agree­ments that must be pub­lished must be made avail­able in at least one of­fi­cial lan­guage of the Con­fed­er­a­tion.

² In the case of mul­ti­lat­er­al agree­ments that must be pub­lished, it must be en­sured that an ori­gin­al ver­sion in at least one of­fi­cial lan­guage of the Con­fed­er­a­tion is pro­duced.

³ Ex­cep­tions un­der Art­icle 14 para­graph 2 of the Pub­lic­a­tions Act of 18 June 2004⁸ and spe­cial pro­vi­sions of fed­er­al le­gis­la­tion are re­served.

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­tons shall en­cour­age the ex­change of school stu­dents and teach­ers at all school levels.

² The Con­fed­er­a­tion may grant fin­an­cial as­sist­ance to the can­tons and ex­change or­gan­isa­tions.

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­tons shall, with­in the scope of their re­spons­ib­il­it­ies, en­sure that the teach­ing lan­guage, and in par­tic­u­lar its stand­ard form, is ac­cor­ded spe­cial at­ten­tion at all aca­dem­ic levels.

² They shall, with­in the scope of their re­spons­ib­il­it­ies, en­cour­age pluri­lin­gual­ism among learners and teach­ers.

³ They shall, with­in the scope of their re­spons­ib­il­it­ies, be com­mit­ted to a sys­tem of teach­ing for­eign lan­guages that guar­an­tees that at the end of their com­puls­ory school­ing, stu­dents have skills in at least one second na­tion­al lan­guage and one oth­er for­eign lan­guage. The teach­ing of the na­tion­al lan­guages shall take ac­count of the cul­tur­al as­pects of a pluri­lin­gual coun­try.

The Con­fed­er­a­tion may grant fin­an­cial as­sist­ance to the can­tons to:

a.

de­vise the ba­sic re­quire­ments for the teach­ing of a second and third na­tion­al lan­guage;

b.

pro­mote skills in the loc­al na­tion­al lan­guage among those who speak a dif­fer­ent lan­guage;

c.

pro­mote the skills of those who speak a dif­fer­ent lan­guage in their own moth­er tongue.

In or­der to co­ordin­ate, in­tro­duce and con­duct ap­plied re­search on lan­guages and pluri­lin­gual­ism, the Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­tons may sup­port an aca­dem­ic in­sti­tu­tion suit­able for this pur­pose.

The Con­fed­er­a­tion may grant fin­an­cial as­sist­ance to:

a.

news agen­cies of na­tion­al im­port­ance that re­port on the four lan­guage re­gions of the coun­try;

b.

non-profit-mak­ing or­gan­isa­tions and in­sti­tu­tions of na­tion­al im­port­ance that by their activ­it­ies pro­mote un­der­stand­ing in at least one lan­guage re­gion or carry out fun­da­ment­al work pro­mot­ing pluri­lin­gual­ism and pub­lish the res­ults;

c.

joint bod­ies that sup­port pro­jects that in­crease un­der­stand­ing between the lin­guist­ic com­munit­ies.

The Con­fed­er­a­tion may grant fin­an­cial as­sist­ance to non-profit-mak­ing or­gan­isa­tions and in­sti­tu­tions act­ive in Switzer­land for writ­ten trans­la­tions from one of­fi­cial Swiss lan­guage in­to the oth­ers.

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall en­cour­age its em­ploy­ees to fur­ther their know­ledge of the na­tion­al lan­guages.

² The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall en­sure that the lin­guist­ic com­munit­ies are fairly rep­res­en­ted in the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies and ex­tra-par­lia­ment­ary com­mit­tees, and shall en­cour­age pluri­lin­gual­ism in the armed forces.

³ The Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­tons shall make their ter­min­o­logy data­bases avail­able to each oth­er free of charge.

¹ With­in the lim­its of the au­thor­ised cred­its, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant the pluri­lin­gual can­tons fin­an­cial as­sist­ance so that they may per­form their spe­cif­ic tasks.

² The can­tons of Bern, Fri­bourg, Graubünden and Val­ais are con­sidered to be pluri­lin­gual.

³ Spe­cif­ic tasks are in par­tic­u­lar:

a.

es­tab­lish­ing suit­able con­di­tions and aids for the pluri­lin­gual work in polit­ic­al au­thor­it­ies, the law en­force­ment and justice sys­tem, and ad­min­is­trat­ive au­thor­it­ies;

b.

en­cour­aging pluri­lin­gual­ism among learners and teach­ers in the of­fi­cial lan­guages of the can­ton at all aca­dem­ic levels.

¹ With­in the lim­its of the au­thor­ised cred­its, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant the can­tons of Graubünden and Ti­cino fin­an­cial as­sist­ance to sup­port:

a.

meas­ures to pre­serve and pro­mote the Ro­man­sh and Itali­an lan­guages and cul­tures;

b.

or­gan­isa­tions and in­sti­tu­tions that ful­fil supra-re­gion­al re­spons­ib­il­it­ies to pre­serve and pro­mote the Ro­man­sh and Itali­an lan­guages and cul­tures;

c.

pub­lish­ing activ­it­ies in Ro­man­sh and Itali­an-speak­ing Switzer­land.

² In or­der to pre­serve and pro­mote the Ro­man­sh lan­guage, the Con­fed­er­a­tion may sup­port meas­ures to sup­port the Ro­man­sh me­dia.

³ Fed­er­al fin­an­cial as­sist­ance shall amount to a max­im­um of 75 per cent of the over­all costs.

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant fin­an­cial as­sist­ance in re­sponse to an ap­plic­a­tion. Ap­plic­a­tions must provide in­form­a­tion on the in­ten­ded meas­ures and in­clude a fund­ing plan.

² The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant fin­an­cial as­sist­ance in the form of a pub­lic ser­vice agree­ment or a rul­ing. If pos­sible, pub­lic ser­vice agree­ments shall be entered in­to for a term of sev­er­al years.

Mul­tiple grants of fin­an­cial as­sist­ance un­der this Act are not per­mit­ted.

¹ The can­tons, or­gan­isa­tions and in­sti­tu­tions shall sub­mit reg­u­lar re­ports to the Con­fed­er­a­tion on the use of fin­an­cial as­sist­ance grants.

² The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall reg­u­larly re­view the util­ity and ef­fect­ive­ness of the meas­ures.

³ It shall with the as­sist­ance of the can­tons com­pile stat­ist­ics on stu­dent ex­change schemes un­der Art­icle 14. The can­tons shall provide the Con­fed­er­a­tion with the re­quired data in a stand­ard­ised form.¹⁰

The re­peal and amend­ment of the ex­ist­ing le­gis­la­tion are reg­u­lated in the An­nex.

¹ This Act is sub­ject to an op­tion­al ref­er­en­dum.

² The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall de­term­ine the com­mence­ment date.

Com­mence­ment date:¹¹ 1 Janu­ary 2010
Num­ber I of the An­nex comes in­to force at the same time as the Lan­guages Or­din­ance.