Language, power and justice: an approach to the current debates on the territoriality and personality principles

Abstract

The territoriality and personality principles have been profusely used for the analysis of language policies, both in sociolinguistics and political theory, in order to describe different organisational models in plurilingual states and to judge their degree of justice for the language groups coexisting in those states. Despite the fact that some authors have questioned their utility, over the last decade the main political philosophers who have addressed minority language rights have continued to use that dichotomy. This article has two main aims: on the one hand, to provide an updated conceptual analysis of these principles, according to the most recent contributions in the field of political theory; and on the other hand, to point out that
a thorough examination of contemporary theories of linguistic justice lead to conclude that a contextualized application of such theoretically opposed principles entails similar political solutions.

Keywords: linguistic territoriality principle, linguistic personality principle, linguistic justice, linguistic pluralism, language policy, political theory.