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Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

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Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#11

Post by duxat_staglatz »

dmurray wrote: post #8
lovasoa wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is wrong. The french version stated: > Retrait des forces armées israéliennes des territoires occupés lors du récent conflit. In this context, "des" means "de les". It is indeed a definite article.

Isn't it ambiguous? I would translate "withdraw from territories" and "withdraw from the territories" the same way (edit: so does Google Translate). It's a failure by the translator who should have worded it "retrait...de tous les territoires" or "retrait...de certaines territoires" (withdrawal from all, or some of the territories) as appropriate. It's clear in the context of a good-faith negotiation that Israel wasn…

"withdraw from territories" would be translated as "Retrait des forces armées israéliennes _de_ territoires occupés lors du récent conflit" and "withdraw from the territories" as "Retrait des forces armées israéliennes _des_ territoires occupés lors du récent conflit". It is not ambiguous at all.

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#12

Post by duxat_staglatz »

dmurray wrote: post #3

This seems like a solved problem: agree at the time which translation takes precedence in the event of a dispute. Use a third language (historically French was the language of diplomacy, now English, but for modern treaties you could pick any major world language) if, as is likely, neither side likes the idea of the binding version being in the other side's language. The same problem has to be solved in countries wit…

Third party language implies that either citizens of country 1 must learn this third party language to the proficiency needed to understand legalese; or to both be expected to know, understand and apply the law but not be able to read it.

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#13

Post by dmurray »

duxat_staglatz wrote: post #12
dmurray wrote: post #3

This seems like a solved problem: agree at the time which translation takes precedence in the event of a dispute. Use a third language (historically French was the language of diplomacy, now English, but for modern treaties you could pick any major world language) if, as is likely, neither side likes the idea of the binding version being in the other side's language. The same problem has to be solved in countries wit…

Third party language implies that either citizens of country 1 must learn this third party language to the proficiency needed to understand legalese; or to both be expected to know, understand and apply the law but not be able to read it.

Proficiency in another language is the minimum I expect of diplomats. It's not like every citizen has to speak it.

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#14

Post by duxat_staglatz »

dmurray wrote: post #13
duxat_staglatz wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Third party language implies that either citizens of country 1 must learn this third party language to the proficiency needed to understand legalese; or to both be expected to know, understand and apply the law but not be able to read it.

Proficiency in another language is the minimum I expect of diplomats. It's not like every citizen has to speak it.

Which is my second point: citizens will have to follow and vote on the law of their country, including international treaties, without understanding them since they are not written in their language.

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#15

Post by tasogare »

dmurray wrote: post #8
lovasoa wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is wrong. The french version stated: > Retrait des forces armées israéliennes des territoires occupés lors du récent conflit. In this context, "des" means "de les". It is indeed a definite article.

Isn't it ambiguous? I would translate "withdraw from territories" and "withdraw from the territories" the same way (edit: so does Google Translate). It's a failure by the translator who should have worded it "retrait...de tous les territoires" or "retrait...de certaines territoires" (withdrawal from all, or some of the territories) as appropriate. It's clear in the context of a good-faith negotiation that Israel wasn…

No, it’s not ambiguous (native speaker here).

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#17

Post by pdpi »

duxat_staglatz wrote: post #14
dmurray wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Proficiency in another language is the minimum I expect of diplomats. It's not like every citizen has to speak it.

Which is my second point: citizens will have to follow and vote on the law of their country, including international treaties, without understanding them since they are not written in their language.

AIUI, a treaty is not law unto itself. Rather, the parties to a treaty will pass laws that implement said treaty.

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#18

Post by microtherion »

IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #9
Svip wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With context it is clear. But the way the author takes « des territoires » out of context, makes it look like it's the indefinite article. They should have translated it to 'of the territories'.

Why not just concede that you were wrong? Even if, yes, the author could have made it a bit more difficult for you to be wrong?

He's not really wrong. As a French speaker myself, seeing "from 'des territoires'" and a translation as a definite article was jarring, since the definite form of the article already contains the "from", so preceding the quote with the "from" strengthens the intuitive parse as an indefinite article.

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#19

Post by duxat_staglatz »

pdpi wrote: post #17
duxat_staglatz wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is my second point: citizens will have to follow and vote on the law of their country, including international treaties, without understanding them since they are not written in their language.

AIUI, a treaty is not law unto itself. Rather, the parties to a treaty will pass laws that implement said treaty.

This is not relevant for the political side of the question, e.g. it would not be possible for a citizen on its own to judge whether the merits of a treaty. Say, your senator campaigns on withdrawing from the Iran deal: how are you supposed to assess this position if the deal was in third-party-language Pashto?

In addition, I can present the case of France, where judges must disregard laws that contradict treaties (the hierarchy of norms being Constitution > Treaties > Laws > Executive orders). Therefore treaties, even with no national law to implement them, have a direct effects on the law.

Re: Lost in Translation: Writing treaties in two languages can lead to problems

#20

Post by Corazoor »

tom_mellior wrote: post #7
chki wrote: post #2

A prominent example of this is the Treaty establishing the European Union where every single one of the 20+ language versions is "Canon" and has to be used by the European Court of Justice. There are often judgements with paragraphs devoted to figuring out the hidden differences between certain wordings in different languages. Interestingly this can lead to problems but sometimes it also clears things up if one langu…

Interesting, can you link to some examples? I've read a few ECJ judgements in some high-profile cases, and I've never seen this.

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...

From case C-336/03 (easyCar), section 25: "That interpretation is expressly supported by several language versions of Article 3(2) of the directive, namely the German, Italian and Swedish versions, which mention, respectively, ‘Dienstleistungen in den Bereichen … Beförderung’ (‘services in the transport sector’), ‘servizi relativi … ai trasporti’ (‘services relating to transport’) and ‘tjänster som avser … transport’ (‘services which concern transport’). "

Instances of this are a bit hard to find, since they usually are just one aspect of a larger argument, but they do happen.

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