One language for Europe

A shared protocol

For a European project to work efficiently, it needs one common communication protocol. And that should be English.

This isn't about anyone giving up their language or culture. Every state keeps its own language, its own identity, its own heritage, none of it is at stake. It's purely practical: a single shared protocol for cross-border coordination is what lets everyone communicate efficiently with each other, without any one national language taking precedence over another.

In Switzerland that means concretely: German, French, Italian and Romansh stay exactly what they are, the four national languages under Article 4 of the Federal Constitution. English is added as a fifth element, not in place of anything, but as the protocol that connects the other four with each other and with the rest of Europe.

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Not a thought experiment

This isn't theoretical for me. I'm currently living and working in a South-East European country, and I run into real friction and resentment from locals simply because I don't speak the local language. It's a first-hand reminder of how much smoother things go when there's a common protocol everyone can fall back on, rather than everyone defaulting to their own tongue.

For this to work, people need to accept that this change is coming. None of the feared consequences happen just because we communicate in a common language: no national language disappears, no culture shrinks. Governments across Europe need to actively prepare their populations for this goal, rather than leaving it to chance or standing against it.

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Freedom of movement has to be frictionless

The same principle applies to freedom of movement itself. Local registration processes can take weeks before anything can even begin. If freedom of movement is to be real, it has to be frictionless: someone moving to another member state shouldn't lose time and energy getting bogged down by a local personal registration number before they can start a job or a business.

Some EU countries are faster at this than others, which is exactly why it should be one uniform protocol across all of them. Anything less efficient than how the US handles this is unnecessary friction.

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What this is not

This is not a demand to make English an official language. Official languages remain a matter for the member states, in Switzerland a matter for the Federal Constitution. It is a demand for a shared working protocol for cross-border coordination, so that nobody has to defend their own language in order to take part in the European project.

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One border, one system

We still live in a world of nations and borders. In Europe there should be only one border left: the external border around Europe. Inside that border we need one system of social security, and we need it now - so that nobody who works in another European country collects gaps between the systems.

My vision is a United States of Europe, along the lines of the USA.

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Position

One shared protocol, English, for Europe-wide coordination. Four national languages left untouched in Switzerland. And freedom of movement that deserves the name: one uniform, frictionless registration process for anyone who wants to work or start a business in another member state, as efficient as in the US, not slower.

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