Toubon Law Totally Explained

Everything about The Toubon Law totally explained

The Toubon Law (full name: law 94-665 of 4 August 1994 relating to usage of the French language), is a law of the French government mandating the use of the French language in official government publications, in advertisements, in the workplace, in commercial contracts, in some other commercial communication contexts, in government-financed schools, and some other contexts. The law doesn't concern private, non-commercial communications, web pages or publications from individuals or private bodies.
The law takes its common name from Jacques Toubon, a conservative, who was Minister of Culture when it was passed and who proposed the law to Parliament. A nickname is Loi Allgood – "Allgood" is a morpheme-for-morpheme translation of "Toubon" into English, whereas the law can largely be considered to have been enacted in reaction to the increasing usage of English in advertisements and other occasions in France.

Aspects of the law

One broad aspect of the law is that it makes it mandatory for commercial advertisements and public announcements to be given in French. This doesn't rule out advertisements made in a foreign language: it's sufficient to provide a translation in a footnote. This was justified as a measure for the protection of the consumer. Additionally, product packaging must be in French.
   Another broad piece of the law is the provision applying to workplaces that "any document that contains obligations for the employee or provisions whose knowledge is necessary for the performance of one’s work must be written in French." In 2006 a French subsidiary of a US company was fined over €500,000 plus an ongoing fine of over €20,000 per day for not complying with this provision. The US company, GE Medical Systems, had been providing certain highly technical documentation and software to its French subsidiary in the English language only. Computer software developed outside France generally has to have its user interface and instruction manuals translated into French to be legally used by companies in France. The law includes an exception that "these provisions don't apply to documents coming from abroad", but this exception has been interpreted narrowly by the recent Versailles Court of Appeal decision in the GE Medical Systems case.
   In addition, the law specifies obligations for public legal persons (government administrations, et al.), mandating the use of French in publications, or at least in summaries of publications. In France, it's a constitutional requirement that the public should be informed of the action of the government. Since the official language of France is French, it follows that the French public should be able to get official information in French.
   Other restrictions concerned the use of French in colloquia. These are largely ignored by many public institutions, especially in the academic fields. Some restrictions of the law were found to be unconstitutional by the Constitutional Council (decision 94-345 DC), on grounds that they violated freedom of speech. The Georgia Tech Lorraine Case. A school in France, Georgia Tech Lorraine is the French branch of Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, USA. Students pay fees to attend, making it a commercial activity. All classes at this university are conducted in English. All course descriptions on its French internet website were in English only. Two French lobbying groups, the Association pour la Défense de la Langue Française and the L'Avenir de la Langue Française, filed a complaint against Georgia Tech Lorraine, using the Toubon Law to demand that the website must be in French because the website was effectively a commercial advertisement for the courses. Though the case was dismissed by the court on a minor legal technicality and the lobbying groups chose to drop the matter, the school was moved to offer its French website in French in addition to English, though classes continue to be in English only. Prospective students at the French website are now referred to the Georgia Tech website in the US for certain details about specific courses.
   Under the Toubon law, schools that don't use French as the medium of instruction are ineligible for government funding. This includes the Breton language schools of Brittany.

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