Clarity , no. 61, p. 4 - Clarity International English for Spanish-speaking lawyers: specific language based issues 20 Rosa Margarita Galán Vélez and ... passed a dime a dozen, the

ClarityNumber 61 May 2009

Journal of theinternational associationpromoting plain legal language

Editor in chief:Julie Clement

In this issueCarla S. Firmani and Claudia O. PobleteSIMPLE LAW: laws in citizen-friendly language:a program implemented by Chile’s NationalLibrary of Congress 4

Sergio BlockFrom plain language to business language 8

Christopher BalmfordOpening ceremony remarks forClarity’s third international conference 11

Luis RaigosaLegal language and the technique forlegislation drafting in Mexico: an unresolved matter 15

Gerardo LaveagaWhat our Constitution has to learn from religion 17

Joanna RichardsonPlain English for Spanish-speaking lawyers:specific language based issues 20

Rosa Margarita Galán Vélez andMaría Isabel López SantibáñezPaths that meet: the plain language network 25

Salomé Flores Sierra FranzoniThe journey of Citizen language 27

Christine SmithLeaving legalese behind 29

Neil JamesDefining the profession: placing plain languagein the field of communication 33

Clarity and general news

Members by country 10How to join Clarity 32New members 37Member News 38From the President 39

2 Clarity 61 May 2009

Country representatives

PortugalSandra Ramalhosa [email protected]

Slovak RepublicIng. Ján [email protected]

South AfricaCandice [email protected]

SpainCristina [email protected]

SwedenHelena Englundhelena.englund@

sprakkonsulter.na.se

UKSarah [email protected]

USAProf Joseph [email protected]

ZimbabweWalter [email protected]

Other European countries:Catherine [email protected]

All other countries:Please contact the USArepresentative

Patrons The Rt Hon Sir Christopher Staughton, The Hon Justice Michael Kirby, andH E Judge Kenneth Keith

Founder John Walton

CommitteePresident: Christopher Balmford ([email protected])Members: Country Representatives plus Simon Adamyk, Mark Adler, Michèle Asprey, Peter Butt,

Sir Edward Caldwell, Richard Castle, Annetta Cheek, Julie Clement, Robert Eagleson,Jenny Gracie, Philip Knight, Robert Lowe, John Pare, Daphne Perry, John Walton,Richard Woof.

ArgentinaMaximiliano Marzettimaximiliano.marzetti@

erasmusmundus-alumni.eu

AustraliaChristopher [email protected]

BangladeshA.K. Mohammad [email protected]

BrazilDominic [email protected]

CanadaNicole [email protected]

ChileClaudia Poblete [email protected]

FinlandHeikki [email protected]

GermanySiegfried [email protected]

Hong KongEamonn [email protected]

IndiaDr. K.R. [email protected]

IsraelMyla [email protected]

ItalyChristopher [email protected]

JapanKyal [email protected]

LesothoRetsepile Gladwin [email protected]

MalaysiaJuprin [email protected]

MexicoSalomé Flores Sierra [email protected]

The NetherlandsHélène [email protected]

New ZealandLynda [email protected]

NigeriaDr. Tunde [email protected]

PeruRicardo Leó[email protected]

PhilippinesVictor [email protected]

Honor roll of donors to Clarity

Clarity is managed entirely by volunteers and is funded through membership fees and donations.We gratefully acknowledge those financial supporters who have contributed to Clarity’s success:

$2,500+ Plain English Foundation, one anoymous donor

$1,000+ Christopher Balmford, Joseph Kimble, Julie Clement

$500+ None

$100+ None

Clarity 61 May 2009 3

An international associationpromoting plain legal languagewww.clarity-international.netPresidentChristopher [email protected]

Clarity … the journalPublished in May and November

Editor in chiefJulie ClementPO Box 13038Lansing, Michigan 48901Fax: 1 517 334 [email protected]

Advertising ratesFull page: £150Smaller area: pro rataMinimum charge: £20Contact Joe Kimble, [email protected]

Copyright policyAuthors retain copyright in their articles. Any-one wanting to reproduce an article in wholeor in part should first obtain the author’s per-mission and should acknowledge Clarity as thesource.

SubmissionsWe encourage you to submit articles to be con-sidered for publication in Clarity. Sendsubmissions directly to editor in chief JulieClement. Please limit submissions to approxi-mately 1,500 or 3,000 words.

If the Revised Rent payable on and from anyReview Date ha e relevant ReviewDate rent R payable at therate prev eed RevisedRent pa forthwithpay to differencebetwee f Rent inrespect e relevantReview ceeding theRent Date attainmentand rent pa spect ofsuch period tog latedRate on each installment of such diffe e

Clarity

This issueClarity 61 includes some of the papers pre-sented in November 2008 at the 3rd Inter-national Clarity Conference, Legal language:transparent and efficient, co-hosted by theInstituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México(ITAM), the Underministry of Public Admin-istration in Mexico and Clarity.

We think of this conference as the opportunityfor Spanish speakers to meet plain-languageexperts from all over the globe. During 5 days,public servants from different governmentoffices, officers from the judicial branch,teachers, students, and consultants fromMexico, Argentina, Chile, and Peru learnedabout the legendary Swedish experience inusing plain language, the recent experience ofthe Bureautaal on rewriting the Constitutionof the Netherlands, and the techniques usedin some English-speaking countries to teachplain language.

In this issue you will find Christopher Balm-ford’s opening remarks of the Conference,which were superbly delivered by Joe Kimble,explaining why, how, and what was the purposeof organizing it in Mexico City. You will alsofind, for the first time in Clarity, more paperswritten by Spanish experts such as the oneabout the experience of Chile’s NationalLibrary Congress in publishing laws in acitizen-friendly language by Claudia Pobleteand Carla Firmani; another one by Luis Raigosa,a distinguished Mexican lawyer who elabo-rates for the first time on the technique forlegislative drafting in Mexico; and the one bya prestigious law practitioner, GerardoLaveaga, which presents a serious andthoughtful case on the Mexican Constitution.

We also included two more papers on plain-language training: one focused on businesslanguage by the consultant Sergio Block, andthe other one on Plain English for Spanish-speaking lawyers written by JoannaRichardson, an Argentinean plain-languagetrainer. You will also find a contribution byMargarita Galan, the President of the PlainLanguage Network in Mexico and the proudco-organizer of this splendid Conference.

For those with an English background, wehave included Christine Smith’s remarks onhow to leave legalese behind and the articleby Neil James about setting standards anddefining the profession, which has been the


most important topic in the current plain-language world.

We sincerely hope you enjoy reading this issueas much as Julie Clement and I did enjoy put-ting together these papers and the hundreddetails required to make the Conference pos-sible. If you want to get more informationabout other sessions please go to www.funcionpublica.gob.mx/lenguajeclaro.

I will end this long introduction thanking allthe people that attended Mexico City’s Con-ference, as it was thanks to you that a seedof plain language has been sowed in Spanishspeakers. We are sure that after November2008, some of them understand how usingplain language can bear fruits in their profes-sions.

Let’s keep sowing the seeds of plain languagebut this time in Oceania. Hope to see youagain at the PLAIN’s Sydney, Australia,conference in October 2009.

Salomé Flores Sierra [email protected]

Carla S. FirmaniJournalist (Chile)

Claudia O. PobleteProfessor, Universidad de ValparaísoClarity’s representative in Chile

“Nobody can claim ignorance of a law afterit has become effective,” establishes Article 8of Chile’s Civil Code. And once a law is pub-lished in the Public Record, “it will beunderstood that it is known to all citizens”(Article 7 of the Civil Code).

The statement above implies that Chile’s law-making process is closely linked to its public:the citizen. However, nothing is further fromthe truth in Chile because although laws arepassed a dime a dozen, the public for whomthese laws are meant know very little aboutthe rights and responsibilities containedwithin this legislation.

The process of passing a law in Chile startswith the Initiative, in which a legislative pro-posal is analyzed by the National Congress.Afterwards, a Discussion occurs, in which theSenate and the House of Representatives studyand analyze the bill. The bill is debated withinCongress and voted upon during the bill ap-proval phase, and then is sent to the Presidentfor approval or veto. If approved, the billbecomes a law and is published in the PublicRecord. From this moment on, the law is ineffect and presumably known to all citizens.

As can been seen, laws in Chile are made byand for specialists. Many professionals are in-volved throughout this entire process:senators, representatives, parliamentary advi-sors, etc, the vast majority of whom areattorneys. The final public for whom the lawis meant is not considered in any of thestages.

SIMPLE LAW:laws in citizen-friendlylanguage: a programimplemented by Chile’sNational Library of Congress

Raising the standardThe Plain English Foundation is de-lighted to host the seventh biennial PlainLanguage Association InterNational(PLAIN) conference.

When: Thursday 15 October to Saturday17 October 2009.

Where: Four Points by Sheraton, DarlingHarbour, Sydney, Australia.

Who: Government, industry and plainlanguage practitioners from Australiaand around the world.

Why: To learn how plain language is im-proving services and saving money ingovernment, industry, the law, medicine,engineering and finance.

For more information, visit the confer-ence web page: http://www.plainenglishfoundation.com/tabid/3276/Default.aspx


The main challenge of creating laws in clearlanguage is that when writing laws, lawmak-ers generally rely on their predilection for“baroque writing,” which is considered pres-tigious in Chilean society. As such, theyusually consider the following principles:

• Using intellectual and technical terms toadd value and prestige to the text.

• If the text is difficult to understand, it ismore valuable.

• Legislation is complex. Therefore, the textshould also be complex.

This set of principles contradicts the guide-lines of writing, which has the followingpremises:

• A good text uses language suitable for itstarget audience or reader.

• A high-quality text uses language appro-priate for the document, that is, its subjectand objective.

• Any text targeting citizens should bedesigned so that the most important pointscan be found easily.

• The law should be understood after readingthe text only once.

• A law written in clear language shouldmeet all these guidelines as well as legalrequirements.

Given this scenario, we can deduce that legis-lative technique (understood as the steps takento create and write laws adequately) is not anessential element in creating laws in Chile. Inthis sense, our legislative situation is very dif-ferent from countries such as Sweden, where alaw cannot be passed if it has not undergonecareful review by a language commission toensure it is clear and understandable to citi-zens.

A study carried out by the Faculty of Law atthe Universidad de Chile in 2002 included asurvey in several of Chile’s regions to assesscitizens’ knowledge on laws regarding labor,family, and access to justice. The results:3.58% did not respond; 0.66% responded thatthey did not know anything; 14.92% statedthat they “knew a little”; 52.54% said that theyknew “somewhat” about laws; and only15.75% responded that they “thought” theyhad sufficient knowledge to apply the lawsindependently. Approximately 28.3% of thosesurveyed did not believe they possessed basic

knowledge of the rights and responsibilitiesin question and thereby felt that they were notcapable of applying these kinds of laws indepen-dently.

Given this scenario and considering that theNational Library of Congress (BCN, as per itsname in Spanish) has the mission of improv-ing knowledge and understanding aboutlegislation and how it is created, this institu-tion has offered to become a bridge betweenlaw creation and citizens. As such, at the endof 2004, the SIMPLE LAW was created in re-sponse to the multitude of citizens’ questionsreceived via email (over 1,000 per month).The SIMPLE LAW is a way to connect lawsand the Chilean citizens by using simple,clear, and direct language. This informationis freely available on the BCN website(www.bcn.cl), where it is the site’s third-mostvisited page.

SIMPLE LAW for reading, distributing,and listening

The SIMPLE LAW includes four formats:

a) Frequently asked questions. The FAQsection explains a law or several lawslinked to a topic by presenting the mostcommon questions and answers abouthow this law affects citizens. Content isfocused on citizen action.

To date, over 100 simple laws exist ondifferent topics related to public admin-istration, consumers, culture, defense,human rights, education, elections,companies, families, taxes, justice, labor,environment, social organizations,health, social security, transportation,and housing. They are available atwww.bcn.cl.

b) Brochures. The brochures on SIMPLELAW are the result of a request made bymembers of Congress, so they coulddistribute this information in theirregions and counties in order to increaseknowledge on the laws. These brochurescan be personalized for each senator orrepresentative using a space set aside fortheir picture and signature.

Over 70 brochures have been publishedto date, all of which are available on theCongressional intranet, where legislatorscan download and print them.


c) Podcasts. Now laws can be listened to.In two minutes, a story is told with thelaw’s most important points, using a radiodrama style to make the informationmore interesting.

More than 30 podcasts have been recordedand are available at www.bcn.cl. Theycan be listened to online or downloaded.

d) Simple law in Mapudungun. Recently,SIMPLE LAW was translated to Mapu-dungun, the language of the Mapuchepeople, one of Chile’s indigenous peoples.Eighteen laws were translated, in audio-visual (DVD) format and audio, whichare also available at www.bcn.cl.

More simple laws may be translated intoAymara and Rapa Nui, the language spokenon Easter Island.

How is the SIMPLE LAW made?

1. Selection

Two criteria are used for selecting the laws ortopics to be address: bills of national socialimportance that have already passed throughCongress and will soon be made into laws;and laws that are frequently asked about atthe BCN.

2. Content

First, the text of the law is reviewed to iden-tify necessary background information, andin some cases, depending on the law’s com-plexity, an expert attorney is consulted forinsight on the key aspects to emphasize.

Once this analysis has been completed, thetext is designed, considering which contentwill be addressed, what will be left out, andwhat questions people would most likely ask.So begins the challenge of explaining the lawin the clearest and most concise way possible.

3. Editing and legal review

Once a preliminary draft has been written, itis reviewed by a style editor. Any commentsare considered, and changes are made; a sec-ond draft is then sent to the legal review. Thisstage is critical, since the result of this “nego-tiation” is fundamental to using the desiredcontent. We talk about “negotiation,” sinceattorneys often feel uncomfortable with thereader-friendly language used, which tothem may seem less rigorous and appropri-

ate. Yet this is precisely the task that the jour-nalist must undertake: saying the same thingbut in a way that is easier to understand.

For example, we can consider the differencesbetween the original text of the Tobacco Lawand the content presented as SIMPLE LAW.

• Read the Law at http://www.bcn.cl/leyes/pdf/actualizado/30786.pdf

• Read the FAQ and listen to the podcast at:http://www.bcn.cl/guias/ley-del-tabaco

• Read the brochure on page 7.

© CFirmani [email protected]

© CPoblete [email protected]

References

Biblioteca del Congreso Nacional. URL: http://www.bcn.cl/

Cassany, D. (2005). El lenguaje como instrumentodemocratizador. Conferencia. Valparaíso: Senado deChile.

Carla S. Firmani is aJournalist with a MastersDegree in ScientificCommunication from theUniversidad Pompeu Fabra.She is responsible fordeveloping content such as theSimple Law for Chile’sNational Library of Congress.

Claudia O. Poblete has aMasters Degree in AppliedLinguistics from the PontificiaUniversidad Católica deValparaíso. She currentlyteaches at the Universidad deValparaíso and is Clarity’srepresentative in Chile.


SIMPLE LAW Brochure with English translations in boxes.

Anti-tobacco law

National Library of Congresswww.bcn.cl

In addition, tobacco compa-nies cannot use promotions,contests, or prizes to attractconsumers.

The police and the Ministryof Health will be responsiblefor enforcing this law.

Congress makes laws for you

A

B

Modification of the Law onTobacco Advertising andConsumption

Law 19.4179 B

Advertising control

In order to avoid an in-crease in smokers and theharm caused by smoking,tobacco advertising is pro-hibited, except in placeswhere tobacco productsare sold.

A

C D

E

F

C

D

E

F


From plain languageto business language

Sergio BlockAssociate, ContextoDidáctico, S.C. Mexico City

What is needed to improve the way peoplewrite on the job? And how can we make surethis improvement generates benefits for theorganization? These are questions I’ve askedmyself during 20 years of teaching writtencommunications techniques and methods(including Plain Language) in both public andprivate organizations in Mexico.

Plain Language is part of the answer, butother conditions are necessary for people tochange the way they write. As I see it, themost important are:

• Aligning training towards business

• Achieving management commitment

• Integrating learning into the workenvironment

• Providing a complete set of tools

• Stimulating a different way of thinking

When these five conditions are met, plain-language projects become business-languageprojects. And that makes a difference becausebusiness people care about business language.

Aligning training towards business

The first condition that must exist for an or-ganization to achieve benefits through writtencommunications is the alignment of trainingtowards specific, relevant business results.This may seem like an obvious argument, buttoo often the training goal is improving writ-ing for its own sake. In these cases, wherethere’s no visible tie between writing and anorganization’s desired results, it’s very hard togenerate the “traction” necessary for chang-ing old habits.

I’ve experienced successful training processeswhen, for example,

• a loan approval committee recognizes thatcredit analysis quality affects loan portfolioquality,

• a call center discovers a relation betweenthe trainer guide design and the length andquality of calls,

• a VP of sales needs to understand complexinformation in a short time so he can makecorrect decisions,

• a tax collector’s office discovers a connec-tion between taxpayers’ willingness tocomply and the tone and content of itsmessages to taxpayers, or

• the quality of training materials signif-icantly cuts time to market (TTM).

On the other hand, I don’t remember a singlesuccessful training process when improvingdocument quality was an end in itself. In suchcases, training tends to be a waste of time andresources for the organization.

It’s important to find the business problems tobe solved with better writing and to evaluatetraining efforts with metrics that determinethe business impact, and not with metrics thatonly report how many people took a courseor how many documents were improved tothe extent that they comply with plain lan-guage standards. It’s sad to say, however, thatthese methods are the ones most commonlyused in Mexico. I think it’s urgent to changethis practice. Only measurements of the im-pact of communications on business cangenerate and maintain management involve-ment, the second condition for success inlearning and applying plain language.

Achieving management commitment

It’s very hard to change writing habits (whichtend to be deeply entrenched in an organiza-tion) when management doesn’t show anemphatic, visible, consistent commitment tochange. Without this, people tend to be afraidof change or lack the motivation to go to thetrouble, or use the management’s attitude asan excuse for not changing (“My boss likes itthis way . . .” a devastating phrase that I’veheard hundreds of times, always when theboss alluded to is not there to deny it).

Commitment is visible when managers

• publicly affirm the need for clear reader-and business-oriented documents,


• actively participate in the process (intraining events as well as in documentplanning and review activities), and

• help obtain resources and remove obstacles.

Once you can count on the management’scommitment, it’s possible to generate thethird condition: the integration of learninginto the work environment.

Integrating learning into the work environ-ment

A person may be able to learn plain-languagetechniques in a workshop, but this will not beenough to change on-the-job habits. Integrat-ing learning into the workplace environmentis basic for converting new skills into newwriting habits. Workshop activities must beapplied in daily practice.

After a course, the responsibility for achiev-ing ongoing, visible results is shared byparticipants who apply what they learned,managers who help to revise documents andmake them more specific, and instructors whowork with participants to create a bridge be-tween writing and business.

Important questions come up after the coursewhen specific documents satisfying concreteneeds are generated in daily work. In thisstage of integrating skills into work, one tendsto discover that plain language is only part ofthe solution. Communications problems in areal situation require a more complete set oftools.

Providing a complete set of tools

Many plain language courses are limited topresenting general recommendations forwriting clearly and directly and, sometimes,to a few pre-writing techniques. Although allthis is important, other tools are also neededfor resolving real problems, such as:

• Methods for analyzing and organizinginformation.

These are necessary for working with long,complex texts like reference manuals andtraining materials. They tend to includemore robust pre-writing techniques,taxonomies for analyzing and classifyingcontent, and specific guidelines forpresenting the various types of information.

• Graphic communications techniques.

Such techniques are always desirable andsometimes indispensable. This is true, forexample, in communicating quantitativeanalysis results or in communicating withpeople with low reading capacity, whetherdue to lack of ability or to insufficient time.

• Models and guidelines for specificdocuments.

Examples include how to express an auditfinding, how to construct a convincing salesargument, and how to diagram the steps ina process. Such tools allow for the applica-tion of general recommendations in plainlanguage in real, specific circumstances.They help in thinking and writing aboutconcrete subjects.

• E-writing tools and techniques.

These include interface and navigationdesign.

Stimulating a different way of thinking

Given the five previously mentioned condi-tions, only the final ingredient is lacking.Better writing requires better thinking and,in turn, stimulates it. It’s not enough to con-vince people to change from the passive tothe active voice. We must convince them tothink more and to think better. I’d like to endwith these words by Orwell that reflect themost important conclusion of my experiencein teaching and promoting plain language.

It (the English language) becomes ugly andinaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, butthe slovenliness of our language makes it easierfor us to have foolish thoughts. The point isthat the process is reversible. Modern English,especially written English, is full of bad habitswhich spread by imitation and which can beavoided if one is willing to take the necessarytrouble. If one gets rid of these habits one canthink more clearly, and to think clearly is anecessary first step toward political regener-ation: so that the fight against bad English isnot frivolous and is not the exclusive concernof professional writers.

I think that if you replace “political regenera-tion” with “economical regeneration”,Orwell’s argument remains true.

© SBlock [email protected]


Sergio Block has worked withthe company ContextoDidáctico (formerlySoluciones Didácticas) since1989. Its purpose is to helpimprove peoples’ performancethrough better communicationof the knowledge and infor-mation they need in order to actand decide. Contexto Didácticois the exclusive distributor ofInformation Mappingproducts and services in Mexico.

He has participated in more than 150 company projectsrelated to written communication. Some examples are:• Better communication of audit results (financial

groups and governmental regulatory andsupervisory agencies)

• Better communication of credit analysis results(financial groups)

• Better sales communication (consulting andinformation services)

• Design and preparation of learning materials (allkinds of businesses)

• Standards and training design for training developers(telephone company)

• Standards and training design for processes andsystems documentation (industrial and servicecompanies, Federal Public Administration branchoffices)

• Design and development of e-Learning programs onsubjects such as Medicine for Non Doctors, salesproducts information, and text repair

Clarity seminarson clear legal writing

conducted by Mark Adler

Mark Adler uses many before-and-afterexamples to teach the theory and prac-tice of clear, modern legal writing,covering style, layout, typography, andstructure. One handout gives an outlineof the lecture, which is interspersedwith exercises and discussion; the othergives model answers to the exercises.

The seminars are held on your premises,and you may include as many delegatesas you wish, including guests from out-side your organisation. The normal sizeranges between 4 and 25 delegates.

The length of the seminars can be tai-lored to your convenience but theyusually run for 3 hours, 5 hours, or 1.5days.

Individual tuition is also available (inperson or by email) to combine trainingwith the improvement of your own docu-ments.

Contact Mark Adler [email protected]

Argentina 3Australia 83Austria 1Bahamas 2Bangladesh 6Belgium 7Bermuda 1Brazil 1British Virgin Islands 1British West Indies 3Canada 60Chile 4China 1Cote d’Ivore 1Denmark 2Finland 7France 2

Germany 2Hong Kong 18India 7Ireland 3Isle of Man 1Israel 4Italy 6Jamaica 1Japan 7Jersey 1Lesotho 2Malaysia 1Mexico 6Mozambique 1Netherlands 7New Zealand 21Nigeria 9

Peru 1Philippines 1Portugal 4Singapore 6Slovak Republic 1South Africa 162Spain 3St. Lucia 1Sweden 20Switzerland 1Thailand 1Trinidad and Tobago 3United Kingdom 132USA 211Zimbabwe 1

Members by country

Total 830


Christopher BalmfordPresident, Clarity

Mexico City, Mexico20–23 November 2008

— as delivered by Professor Joseph Kimble,immediate past president

Welcome

• Mr Sergio Penagos García, the UnderMinister of Public Administration

• Ms Rosa Margarita Galán Vélez,the President of the Mexican PlainLanguage Network

• Dr. Alejandro Hernández Delgado, Chief ofthe Academic Division for Economics, Law& Social Sciences

• Mr José Roldán Xopa, the Head of ITAMLaw School

• Ambassador of Sweden, Ms AnnaLindstedt

• Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen

My name is Joe Kimble, I am the immediatepast-president of Clarity.

I’m here today representing Clarity’s presi-dent, Christopher Balmford from Australia,who is unable to be here for personal reasons.Christopher sends his deepest apologies toyou all. He has asked me to deliver his wel-coming remarks to you.

Here goes . . .

Welcome to Clarity’s 3rd international confer-ence.

It is exciting that we are here (. . . and a pitythat I am not!).

From Cambridge, England, our first confer-ence in 2002, to Boulogne Sur Mer, in Francein 2005, and now here today in Mexico City

at this marvellous university (which I visitedlast year as part of organising this confer-ence), it is clear that the themes and concernsthat unite us at Clarity are shared in manylanguages and in many countries.

The need for clear legal and administrativecommunications is universal. For helping usto explore these universal themes, Clarity’swarmest thanks:

• to our sponsor the Underministry of PublicAdministration; and

• to our sponsor and host, ITAM.

Mexico and plain language

At Clarity, we first became aware of Mexico’swonderful plain-language activities when—at our conference in France in 2005—SaloméFlores Sierra Franzoni outlined Mexico’sproject.

Salomé told us that the project began, moreor less, when her boss said to her somethinglike:

Salomé, out there in the world there issomething called “plain language”. Goout into the world. Find out what it is.And bring it home to Mexico.

Salomé and her colleagues have achievedthat task admirably. And now, today, we theplain-language world, have come here tolearn from Mexico.

Already, just in setting the theme for this con-ference, our journey has been worthwhile.Mexico’s plain-language activities have iden-tified, and made prominent, a new additionto the many benefits of plain language—namely, the fact that the transparency a cleardocument delivers can help overcome cor-ruption.

Conventionally, the benefits of plain languageare:

Opening ceremony remarks forClarity’s third international conference


• First, “fairness”—under anystandard of decency and equity,clear documents are needed so thatpeople can make informed andconfident decisions.

• Second, “efficiency” and “effec-tiveness”—reducing cost andimproving outcomes.

• Third, aligning an organisation’sdocuments with its brand andculture. By which I mean, if anorganisation claims to be, say,“customer or client focussed” or“easy to do business with”, or“open and transparent”, then itneeds to write in a style that provesthose claims to be true. For example, aconservative bank should write in a quitedifferent style to that of a progressivemobile phone company. This concept ofaligning a writing style with a brand extendseven to countries. For example the SouthAfrican Constitution contains a Bill ofRights, which includes the statement that:

This Bill of Rights is a cornerstone ofdemocracy in South Africa. It enshrinesthe rights of all people in our country andaffirms the democratic values of humandignity, equality and freedom.1

Those are inspiring brand values for any na-tion: “dignity, equality and freedom”.

• Fourth, “democracy”—as the honorable AM Omar MP, Minister of Justice, Republic ofSouth Africa, said at a conference in CapeTown in March 1995:

Clear, simple communication is . . . anabsolute and critical necessity fordemocracy. People have a right tounderstand the laws that govern them, tounderstand court proceedings in mattersthat affect them, to understand whatgovernment is doing in their name.2

And as Phil Knight, Professor Joseph Kimble,and I said in a report to the same Minister:

Most importantly, plain language allowspeople to visualize themselves as subjectsof the law, and to imagine themselves inthe circumstances with which the lawdeals. This ability to place or imagineoneself within the law is an importantdistinction between a system of justiceand a regime of enforced order.3

These characteristics of fairness, of efficiencyand effectiveness, and of democracy havea common link: “transparency”. Plain-language law and documents are transpar-ent. Meaning shines through. Ideas are laidbare.

Where language is transparent, it is harder tohide purpose or to “spin” meaning—much,much harder.

With transparency comes a reduction in theopportunities for corruption. By “corrup-tion”, I mean not only blatant abuse of power,but also improper bureaucratic decisions andjudicial bias. Plain language—particularlyplain-language laws and regulations—reducesthe opportunity for these kinds of activities.

The benefits of this alone are enormous. Onecost of corruption is public contempt for thelaw and the judicial process. A just society re-quires transparent laws. And plain languagehelps ensure transparent laws.

Clarity and the collapse of Enron

An example of the benefits of transparency—or rather, the horrors of its absence—comesfrom the collapse in 2005 of the US energycompany Enron. Enron’s collapse cost inves-tors so many billions of dollars that thenumber is meaningless to most of us.

The story of Enron—its spectacular rise andfall—is, at its heart, a story of deceit con-cealed by a lack of transparency, by a lack ofclarity.

Even though Enron’s management was lying,the real problem was that the documentsconcealed the truth—even though they con-tained that truth.

Members of the Clarity Committee at a post-conference meeting.


The proof that the documents contained thetruth is shown by the work of 6 business stu-dents at Cornell University. The studentswrote a 23 page report analysing Enron fortheir term project. According to MalcolmGladwell in The New Yorker, Jan 8, 2007, thestudents found that “Enron may be manipu-lating its earnings”.

The students recommended “Sell”.

Their timing was impressive. They recom-mended selling Enron shares in the Northernspring of 1998—about two and a half yearsbefore the company collapsed.

If Enron’s lies had not been hidden by com-plexity, if its documents had been clear, couldEnron have grown so large, could its shareprice have ridden so high?

To be sure, the truth was in Enron’s docu-ments. But truth without clarity has littlevalue.

Clarity and the credit crisis

Enron’s reports—perpetuating and conceal-ing the lies from Enron’s management—were toxically obscure.

Like the collapse of Enron, the current creditcrisis has its roots in unintelligible documents.

Banks have been unwilling to lend to otherbanks because none of them could be surehow much toxic, sub-prime debt they, or anyof the other banks, hold.

Being uncertain of the extent of the risk mustto some extent be because, after months oflooking in the right place (the interbank loandocuments), the best banking minds sup-ported by the sharpest legal advisers can’tfind the answers.

The unintelligibility of those interbank docu-ments—not just the debt itself—is toxic. Firstit was toxic for the organisations that signedthe documents. Now it is toxic for the globalfinancial system, and for us all.

If the contracts for the bundling and transferof sub-prime products had been clear, thensurely the banks would have known fromearly in the sub-prime crisis which of thebanks held how much sub-prime debt.

With that knowledge, banks would be lend-ing to the banks still viable. There would be asub-prime crisis, but less of a credit crisis.

Conclusion

Again and again a lack of clarity causesmuch worse than mere confusion.

It is wonderful that the Mexican governmenthas focussed on improving clarity to deliver

The panel on standards. From the left: Lynda Harris,Helena Englund, Annetta Cheek, and Neil James. Notpictured: Mark Adler (moderator).

U.S. panel on “Language, regulations, and accessibility.”From the left: Amy Bunk, Miriam Vincent, EdderEspinoza Arellano (moderator), and Joanne Locke.

Joe Kimble (center) with conference organizers SalomeFlores and Carlos Valdovinos (Director for RegulatorySimplification of the Ministry of Public Administration).


transparency—the theme of our conference—“delivering transparency and efficiency” andall the benefits they bring.

My apologies for being unable to be here. Ilook forward to reading the proceedings inthe next issue of Clarity. You will receive thatissue too—thanks to your conference packagewhich makes you a member for Clarity for 12months. We hope you’ll renew your Claritymembership then. And we hope that alongthe way, you’ll sign up many other members.

Just before I close, enormous thanks toSalomé for all her work in organising theconference, and for making my role so man-ageable.

Lastly, thank you for coming to the confer-ence. Thank you, indeed.

May the conference be interesting, entertain-ing, and useful for you. May it help plain

The pyramid site viewed from the Temple of the Moon. The Temple of the Sun at the Teotihucan pyramids, theday after the conference.

language everywhere—especially in LatinAmerica and especially, especially in Mexicowhere our hosts and our sponsors have al-ready done so much and are being sohospitable.

Endnotes1 Constitution of the Republic of South Africa 1996,

Chapter 2 Bill of Rights, section 7(1).2 At a plain language conference in Cape Town

sponsored by the Plain English Campaign(United Kingdom) in March 1995, quoted by PHILKNIGHT, PROF. JOSEPH KIMBLE, andCHRISTOPHER BALMFORD in TOWARDSPLAIN LANGUAGE LEGISLATION: ADEMONSTRATION PROJECT ON LEGISLATIVEDRAFTING, A MODEL REVISION OF THEHUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION BILL in theauthors’ covering letter. The model was preparedin May 1995 as a demonstration of plain-language principles at the request of Hon. A MOmar MP, Minister of Justice, Republic of SouthAfrica.

3 See Knight, Kimble, and Balmford, note 1, at 3.

Call for PapersThe journal ESP Across Cultures (www.unifg.it/esp) will be devoting the whole of vol.7 (2010) to the topic of ‘legal English across cultures’. We therefore invite anyone inter-ested in writing about legal English from a cross-cultural perspective to send an abstractof 250-300 words before 15 July 2009, and the completed paper (approx 5,000 words)by 31 December 2009. Please send your abstracts and any queries to Christopher Will-iams at [email protected] or [email protected].


Luis RaigosaDistinguished lawyer and professor, ITAM

The recent International Conference held inMexico City from November 20 to 23, 2008,untitled Legal language: transparent & effi-cient, started a discussion in the Mexican legalcircles about a very important topic for thosewho are concerned with increasing the quality ofthe laws in our country. The topic is critical tohow we produce laws and to our legal-politicalsystem.

A. A brief note on the context of legislativedrafting in Mexico

The Mexican congressmen’s workload hasgrown considerably over the last years. It iswell known that from 1917, the year in whichour current Constitution was written, andduring several years of our recent history, theRevolutionary Institutional Party (PRI) occu-pied the political scene, nationally and in thestates, becoming the formal federal structureof our political system.

The political system allowed the president ofthe Republic to be the “great congressman” ashis party comfortably controlled both cham-bers of the Congress, as well as all 31 statecongresses in the Mexican federation. Thepower of drafting laws and the power overthe legislative bodies unleashed a controlledsystem for drafting the most important rulesof our country: the laws. This stopped in 1997.

In our current parliamentary history, threepolitical parties dominate: the same PRI,which today is the second national politicalforce; the National Action Party (PAN), cur-rently the first political force in both chambersof the Congress; and the Democratic Revolu-tionary Party (PRD), holding the third position.

The legislation drafting process takes place ina context of negotiation among these parlia-mentary forces, in which other minor politicalforces occasionally weigh in.

Legal language and the technique for legislationdrafting in Mexico: an unresolved matter

B. The size of the Mexican federal legalorder

As a federal system, we have a national Con-stitution, which includes 136 articles and 32local constitutions. The national Constitutionhas a unique characteristic of sufferingamendments an extraordinarily high numberof times. According to my calculation, be-tween 1917 and mid-2008, the content of itsarticles has been amended 450 times. Thishas caused a significant increase in the vol-ume of constitutional regulations. In fact,today, the constitutional text is twice as largeas the original document.

In my opinion, we have reached a moment inour country in which we need to analyze thetreatment we have given to the constitutionalcontent, as this fundamental law now containsnumerous regulations that are not proper forits regulatory level. This has distorted thenormal functions of the constitutional andsecondary bodies; it has also disturbed theworking order of the constitutional court incharge of overseeing the amendments of sec-ondary law contents according to the highlyvolatile constitutional texts.

On the other hand, the system includes morethan 252 legal ordinances with a rank or cat-egory of federal law, which contain over30,000 articles. Seven out of 10 ordinanceswere issued during the last 26 years. Thesenumbers show that it is not only the parlia-mentary work that is causing the vigorousgrowth of the “legal mass” in the Mexicanfederal legal order.

These numbers do not include the legal ordi-nances under the law, which are dramaticallymore numerous and complex than the onesproduced by our congressmen. And as onecan imagine, the Public Administration hasno fewer prospects for writing documents inplain language as it establishes relationshipswith private citizens, as well as in its internalrelations.


The volume of written regulations in theMexican federal legal order invites us to re-flect about the need to seriously start toprofessionalize the work of technical legisla-tion drafters. It is not only legislative bodiesthat are responsible for issuing better andclearer legislative messages within an increas-ingly complex regulatory universe. We believethat universities have a significant role inpromoting professional training for legal lan-guage, in every field in which legal drafting isinvolved and legal documents (general orspecific) are issued.

C. Plain language as a tool to improve thequality of the law

The problem with the quality of the laws isnot merely a problem of studying the con-tents and the format for drafting regulations.We have to admit that the practice of legaldrafting, generally, is a highly specializedtask which requires the assistance of profes-sionals from other bodies of knowledge.

This is not only because we have to conveylegal messages that are adequate, clear, andunderstandable to all readers, consideringcontent, structure, style, grammar and de-sign, but also because (this is very important)this has to be done without infringing what isstipulated in the rest of the legal ordinances.If a regulation is clear but it does not satisfyall the required legal mandates for its draft-ing, it is endangering its legal quality as itcould be null and void. Furthermore, anyregulation is of little use if it does not prop-erly solve the social problem that motivatedits creation. Finally, clarity goes together withlegality, as well as with regulatory efficiencyand effectiveness. But let’s insist: the meansthat will allow the congressman to reach ad-equate legal solutions to social problems is thelanguage; and for that, it is essential to issueclear regulations.

It is true that there are developments for put-ting together technical groups to support thework of our congressmen in both federal leg-islative Chambers: offices for legislative

studies and support for their work were cre-ated. There is also a start on trainingprofessional bodies of advisors to congress-men. However, there is a lot to be done tocreate a civil service of professionals in legis-lative drafting, as only a few advisors aremembers of these bodies.

We believe that a legislative civil service iswhere we should train experts in plain-lan-guage legal drafting. Legislation draftersmust not only be experts in law, but they alsomust be able to use legal language appropri-ately, considering their area of expertise andthe need to formulate clear legal messages. Inour opinion, we need professionals with adouble profile: experts in law and experts inlegal language. We must emphasize the needto provide congress’s lawyers with linguistictraining.

University programs for lawyers should in-clude training on drafting regulations(general or particular) with plain-languagetechniques. Considering that drafting regula-tions is almost always supported by naturallanguage, it is recommended to get supportfrom legal-language professionals or philolo-gists with knowledge of the law. We believethat the collaboration between different fieldswill lead to a positive development and appli-cation of law. Finally, creating clear legaldocuments is a demand of the rule of law.

© LRaigosa [email protected]

Luis Raigosa is a lawyer of theLaw Faculty from UNAM andhas a PhD in Law from theUniversidad Complutense inMadrid. He has served as apublic official in severaldepartments of the FederalPublic Administration. He iscurrently a full-time professorand researcher at ITAM. He haspublished several articles andbooks on legislative techniquesand processes. He is head of the project known as theLegislative information system of the Congresses(Legislatoris), with the collaboration of the Senate.


Gerardo LaveagaDirector of the Mexican National Institute for the Studyof Criminal Science; (INACIPE in Spanish).

What makes a society identify with its Con-stitution and consequently obey it? It iscertainly not a coercive system. Such a sys-tem may temporarily sanction those whoviolate it—arrest, jail, and even death. But inthe long run, the costs become very high anda threat of ungovernability arises.

What identifies a society with its Constitution,written or not, is the will of this society to liveup to its principles, its unity, its cohesion.Naturally, such will require a coercive systemto correct deviations. But this system musthave limits: Why is it that only a few membersof a community steal, rape, or murder? Whyis it that the majority of community membersdo not do it? Is it fear of punishment? If ter-rorism were decriminalized tomorrow, howmany of us would go out in the streets to placebombs or assassinate children?

If we think about it, the regulations that governus, the regulations that we obey every day, donot have to be printed on a document, andthere need not be prescribed sanctions forthose who do not obey them. According toLycurgus, “The most important regulations toachieve the happiness in a city and its virtueof the people remained inalterable if it wasinculcated in the character of its citizens.” Hewas right: What identifies a society with itsConstitution is consensus. When this consen-sus has resulted from whatever historical,cultural, political, or economical reasons,neither sanctions nor constitutional text arenecessary. Conversely, if there is no consen-sus, there is no repressive system or documentthat can keep that society united.

In order to have a Constitution that is im-printed in the character of the people, it isnecessary that it be the result of the broadestpossible agreement. The more groups or indi-viduals participate in what the classic thinkers

called “covenant,” the easier it will be tocomply with and uphold. When this is notthe case, when the most important judicialregulations are imposed without regard tosociety, or only considering the immediateinterests of the minority, society at large doesnot find any reasons to comply, but it doeshave has plenty of reasons not to comply.

So demonstrate the civil disobedience move-ments, ever with more philosophicalfoundations, that are proliferating worldwide. From Washington to Kabul, and fromBologna to Cancun, more and more peopleask themselves, “Why should I obey this law?”“Why should I have to pay taxes that onlybenefit a few?” “Why do I have to be draftedto a military service in which I do not believe?”The more access people have to the media orthe Internet, the more informed they are, themore critical they become, and the more will-ing they are to enjoy the benefits of othercommunities.

Now, therefore, how to reach consensus? Byincreasing the social participation channels,in the first place. Second, by creating bureau-cracies that will elicit and generate theconditions where consensus can develop. Butthat is not enough, especially if we considerthat the benefits a few members of a groupmay receive from consensus could be detri-mental to others. Let us think about issuessuch as abortion or “legalization” of certaindrugs . . . That is why it is necessary that thosebureaucracies help society debating on theadvantages and disadvantages of each lawinitiative, of each public policy, as well as toevaluate the utility they will have to eachgroup. For this reason, this exercise presup-poses a permanent educational effort.

Why is it then that, if things appear to be sosimple, in reality this is not the case? At leastin Mexico’s case, because some political oreconomic power groups are afraid that civilsociety, in an exercise of democracy, under-stands its laws, measures their scope, and

What our Constitution has to learnfrom religion


decides to reform them so that the distribu-tion of privileges is wider. To achieve theirpurpose, they take pains to have confusinglaws—almost incomprehensible.

Laws are the result of bargaining and nego-tiation, conciliation and agreement. But, in theend, they are reduced to words. That is why,if this bargaining and negotiation, this con-ciliation and agreement, are not clear to themajority of the men and women that are partof a State, the terms of consensus are left to themercy of those who want to manipulate themto their advantage. A Constitution without ashared concept of democracy or liberty, ofjustice or tolerance, cannot serve its purposeof cohesion that would be expected of it.

Recently, the question of whether our countryneeds a new Constitution has again occupiedthe imagination of many jurists. I think it iseasy to agree that we do not need a newConstitution. Even those who consider thatsome institutions have weakened would ad-mit that they could get strengthen again withnew leadership or minor reforms. However,what does seem to be urgent—and this is notdifficult to guess—is a simpler text. A text thatoutlines Mexico’s great principles, its greatideals, in an accessible language: A text easyto understand for the majority of Mexicansand that encourages unity and solidarity ofthe distinctive groups of our country. We donot have it.

How can we demand a farmer to participatein Mexico’s decisions if he cannot understandthe exceptions to the nullity with respect oflands “that would have been titled in the grantsmade according to the June 25, 1856 law, andpossessed, in one’s own name in title anddominion for more than ten years, as long astheir surface does not exceed fifty hectares,”such as Article 27 of the Constitution provides?

How do we expect that a worker or a small-business person, victimized by the abuse ofsome authority, would go to the tribunals—before arbitration—if, as much as this persontries, he does not have the elements to under-stand the appeal for legal protection [‘amparo’]“against definitive sentences, or arbitrationawards and resolutions that put an end tothe trial, about which there is no ordinaryrecourse by which they can be modified orreformed, whether the violation occurred inthem or occurred during the process, affectthe defenses of the complainant, transcend-

ing to the result of the finding; as long as incivil matter the violation has been objected toin the course of the process through an ordi-nary remedy established by the law andinvoked as an injury in the second instance,if it was committed in the first one,” such asis established in Article 107?

How can we promote the right to vote andspeak of the dangers of abstentionism; dowe really expect that an average voter takeinto consideration at the time of electing rep-resentatives, according to the proportionalrepresentation principle, that “in no case mayone political party have a number of repre-sentatives that for both principles representsa total percentage of the House that exceedsby eight points the percentage of the nationalvotes cast,” even if this provision does notapply “to the political party that, due to itstriumphs in uninominal districts receives apercentage of magistrates of the total of theHouse higher than the sum of the percentageof its national votes cast plus eight percent,” asis established in Article 54 of our Magna Carta?

If what we intend is that the drafting, appli-cation, and interpretation of the Constitutioncontinue in the hands of a few “experts,” wedo not need to worry about promoting anychanges. But, that being the case, we shouldnot expect either that Mexico will advance togreater heights of governability and obedi-ence of the law. Now that some Americanpoliticians point out that Mexico is a “FailedState” this uneasiness becomes relevant. Ifwe endeavor in formulating constitutionalprecepts or complex laws that contradicteach other, it will be more costly each daythat passes.

The Law has to be ductile, which is not to saythat it has to be expressed in such a complexway. If, for technical reasons it has to be donethat way, complexity should not go beyond theregulations. To take it to the Constitutionwould provoke greater divisions in society andthe proliferation of multiple mexicos, withdifferent and even contradicting nationalprojects. It is not that a simpler constitutionaltext will repair social and economic inequities,but, no doubt, it can become the beginningpoint. In destiny and orientation. Easy tounderstand regulations are easy to obey,especially if one participated in their making.As in all modern States, there has to be someroom for ambiguity and interpretation, because


it would be impossible to anticipate everypossible economic, political, and social trans-formation. It would be impossible to anticipateevery case. But this gap should be narrowereach time.

Those of us who study the Constitution, thoseof us who enjoy unraveling it and imaginingits scope, have a lot to learn from the greatreligions: “If you want eternal life [says Juda-ism and now Christianity], follow these tencommandments.” If you aspire to find “theessence of being [Budhism states] guide your-self by these four noble truths” (Satyani). “Ifyou aspire total submission to the will of God[proclaims Islam] follow these four essentialduties” (five, say those who promote yihad,the holy war). They all offer much in ex-change for little. They all promote simplicity.Believers have hope in their god and a fulllife. They know what they have to do be-cause they learned that as children. In hisessay, On the Laws, Cicero tells us how, fromthe time he was a child, he had to learn andrecite the XII Tables. Those were other times,when the foundation of the State was beinglaid.

Why not the take back the invitation fromHäberle and other academics to convert thelegal culture into a secular religion? A religionwhere one uses the least possible words andwhere these few words have an understand-able reach for the majority of people. Thetimes of the legislator priests may be behindus, but not the needs that inspired theirworkings. It is possible that there is no roomfor a Hammurabi, Moses of Mahammed, butthere will always be room for the man orwoman who wants justice from the State ofwhich he or she is a part. And it is becausethe administrative processes of a modernState can be extremely complex, but their es-sential foundations are not. The theoreticalmodels to explain the moment in which eachconduct becomes a crime may be indecipher-able for those who do not know the formulasand the cryptic language of its authors, butthe need that a State has to punish those whoendanger these essential foundations is not.

Some years ago, business administrationscholars began using the term “reengineering.”It was a concept that referred to the conve-nience of reviewing an administrative systemto see whether it worked for that for which ithad been created. If the answer was no, it

had to be dismantled and rebuilt. I do notthink this is the case with our Constitution,but it is the case of its text: It is urgent toreengineer it, if I may use that term. In theirzeal for judicial technique and dogmatic em-bellishment—in the best of cases—or becauseof the excessive demagogic desire to elevateeverything to constitutional level—in theworst case scenario—our legislators have dis-tanced this text from the majority ofMexicans.

Let us decide, then, what it is that we wantof our Constitution: A mystery reserved foronly a few initiates or an instrument that willpropitiate social participation in the construc-tion of the Legal State. Both alternatives haveadvantages and disadvantages for variousgroups; both presuppose losses and gains fordifferent constituencies of the country. That iswhy, independently of what we resolve, wemust not lose sight of the fact that ourNation’s unity is at stake.

© GLaveaga [email protected]

Gerardo Laveaga is theDirector of the MexicanNational Institute for the Studyof Criminal Science; (INACIPEin Spanish).

Call for papers:

We’ve talked a lot about standardsin recent years. Clarity 62 will bedevoted to this topic. Our goal is topublish it slightly earlier than theregular November publication date,so you’ll have even more to talk aboutat PLAIN’s conference in Sydney. Ifyou would like to contribute, pleaseemail editor-in-chief Julie Clementat [email protected] as soon aspossible.


Plain English for Spanish-speaking lawyers:specific language based issues

Joanna RichardsonJoanna Richardson teaches plain-English writing skillsto lawyers at Marval, O’Farrell & Mairal in BuenosAires, Argentina.

Much has already been written in earlier is-sues of Clarity about the advantages of plainEnglish when communicating between differ-ent nationalities using English as a commonlanguage. For a bilingual or multilingual com-pany, there are many advantages to writingin a plain-English style. English has become acommon language for people of different na-tionalities; therefore, a clearer, more conciseway of writing in English will be more readilyunderstood by non-native English speakers.In the bilingual workplace, plain Englishhelps lawyers write with the reader in mindand keep their writing concise and direct.

This article is a result of six years’ experienceteaching plain-English writing skills to law-yers at Marval, O’Farrell & Mairal, Argentina’slargest law firm. Based in Buenos Aires, thislaw firm employs over 400 lawyers, specializ-ing in IP and Corporate law, and a third ofits business is foreign or foreign-derived. Tocarry out business with their clients abroad,these Spanish-speaking lawyers must be ableto communicate clearly and effectively in En-glish, and plain English helps them do so.Taking real life examples from the lawyers’work, this article will address the particulardifficulties for the Spanish-speaking lawyerwriting in plain English.

The majority of these language-based issuesare foundation stones of plain-language writ-ing like compact sentence structure, use ofpersonal pronouns and language of obliga-tion, as well as avoiding hidden verbs, sexistlanguage and the negative. But there are alsotopics that occur only to Spanish speakers,some of which have a more grammaticalbase, like zero article. Others are simply prob-lem areas for many second-languagespeakers such as register and false friends.

There are, of course, other key areas of plainlanguage for lawyers which I have nottouched on here, such as passive voice andlegalisms; as neither of these seems to be anissue specific to the Spanish-speaking lawyer,I have not considered them relevant. Let usnow look in detail at ten language-based is-sues for the Spanish-speaking lawyer writingin plain English.

1. Short sentences

Because of the structure of their own language,Spanish speakers are very comfortable withlong, clause-laden sentences and tend to rep-licate them in English. When translating fromthe Spanish, they have to be encouraged tobreak up one long sentence into two or threeshorter ones.

They must remember to keep their sentenceswith the subject, verb and object close together.In Spanish, long sentences are acceptable, butin English, unless you are Henry James, asentence with two clauses is not consideredgood style, and short sentences are one of thefoundations of plain English. The long sentencemust be broken up and, where necessary, thesubject must be repeated.

For example,

Marval, O’Farrell & Mairal, the largest lawfirm in Latin America, which specializes inpatents and trademarks as well as corporatelaw, was voted best law firm in ‘Apertura’, atop business magazine.

Would become:

Marval, O’Farrell & Mairal is the largestlaw firm in Latin America and specializes inpatents and trademarks, as well as corporatelaw. This firm was voted best law firm in‘Apertura’, a top business magazine.

It can be very difficult to convince Spanish-speaking lawyers to adopt this ‘free translation’approach where they change the structure ofthe original Spanish sentence. It is important


for them to understand that the new struc-ture actually makes more sense in Englishand, what is more, is closer to the originalmeaning.

2. Sentence structure

In both Spanish and English, all sentencesmust have a subject and a main verb, mosthave an object, and some have an indirectobject. But here there is an important gram-matical difference between the two languages.In English, the indirect object must follow thedirect object. In Spanish, it may go in front.When translating, the Spanish-speaking law-yer often retains the same sentence structure,creating sentences which are tortuous andgrammatically incorrect in English.

For example:

We are attaching as exhibit B, the abovementioned letters.

The indirect object here is ‘as exhibit B’, whichshould go after the object, as follows:

We are attaching the above mentioned lettersas exhibit B.

3. Personal Pronouns

Personal pronouns are another foundationstone of plain English, as they address thereader directly. In the US, the Securities andExchange Commission’s (SEC’s) proposed“plain language” rule (release 33-7380) notesthat:

Although not a part of our proposed rules,another effective tool for producing plainEnglish documents is to use personalpronouns. Personal pronouns immediatelyengage your readers’ attention. A familiarwriting style where “we” or “I” refers tomanagement or the company, and “you”refers to the investor, involves your readerand increases comprehension.

The aim is to use the first person plural—we,us, our/ours—and second-person singular—you, your/yours. This is particularly difficultfor the Spanish speaker who, in Spanish, asin other Romance languages, distinguishesbetween the formal “Ud” and the informal“tú”. In English there are other ways of beingpolite, e.g. use of the conditional and saying“please” and “thank-you”, which are bothused far more than in Spanish. Many Span-ish speakers initially feel uncomfortable using

“you” as they feel it sounds too informal, butonce they begin to practice using it, they real-ize that they get a much better response fromtheir clients.

Note the differences between these examples:

before

The table above is intended to show the stateof current oil reserves in the Middle East.

after

You may observe the state of current oilreserves in the Middle East in the tableabove.

Addressing the reader directly and avoidingthe passive voice is still perfectly polite andmakes the writing fresher and more appealing.

4. Avoid hidden verbs

Another aim of plain English is to use strongverbs to give writing accuracy and power. Al-ways try to express action through a verb.Often the strong verb has been converted intoa noun.

Eg: We made the application for the permit.

We can omit the weak verb and turn thenoun back into a strong verb.

We applied for the permit.

This is particularly hard for the Spanishspeaker whose instinct is to opt for moreLatinate language. In legal English, we arealready expressing complex ideas. Therefore,plain English prefers to use shorter, morecommon Anglo-Saxon words so as not tooverwhelm the reader.

For example,

Even if these terms have a similar use in bothsubsections, it is not clear if the legislator hadthe intention of distinguishing them.

Would change to:

Even if these terms have a similar use in bothsubsections, it is not clear if the legislatorintended to distinguish them.

Although we have only removed one hiddenverb, the sentence is stronger and more direct.

5. Avoid the Negative

Another point that the Spanish-speakinglawyer must be aware of is the double nega-tive, which does not exist in English. In


Spanish you can say “no tengo nada” but inEnglish this construction is grammatically in-correct. Another problem with the negative isthat when readers are faced with a negative,they must first imagine the positive alterna-tive, then mentally cancel it out. This is not aclear way of thinking.

For example,

It is not improbable that this law may beextended for another six-month period.

Should read:

It is probable that this law may be extendedfor another six-month period.

6. Language of Obligation

As Bryan A.Garner says in his book “LegalWriting in Plain English”, “the word shall is amess.” Many lawyers incorrectly use shall forfuture action as well as for obligation, leadingto confusion. Thus, leading modern legal draft-ing experts concur with Garner that “must” isa clearer alternative. Many of the lawyers atMarval, O’Farrell & Mairal are now using“must” instead of “shall”, for the sake of clarity.

For example,

National Decree XXX provides that theentities or individuals that are registered torender these services shall comply with thefollowing conditions: . . .

Should read:

National Decree XXX provides that theentities or individuals that are registered torender these services must comply with thefollowing conditions: . . .

But for the Spanish-speaking lawyer, the realdifficulty comes when making statements offact; for example, the definitions provided inthis Agreement have the following meaning:

In English, unlike in Spanish, the present tensecan imply the future, hence the Spanish-speaking lawyer always tries to make a state-ment of fact using either “shall” or “will” in-correctly.

For example,

From a legal point of view, a game of chanceshall/will exist when results are subject to afuture and uncertain event.

Here, there is no obligation and the sentenceshould be in the present tense, as follows:

From a legal point of view, a game of chanceexists when results are subject to a futureand uncertain event.

Once they realize that saying something in thepresent tense means that it is true today, to-morrow, next week and next year, the Spanish-speaking lawyer has no problems in using thepresent to express statements of fact.

7. Avoid sexist language

In Spanish, the issue of sexist language doesnot arise at all, as the masculine gender isconsidered automatically to cover the femi-nine, making this a particularly complicatedarea for the Spanish-speaking lawyer writingin English. Spanish has only one possessivepronoun “su” so lawyers will often incor-rectly translate it as “his”, assuming that themasculine possessive pronoun covers bothgenders. They also have to learn to write us-ing he or she and using gender-neutral nounsas much as possible.

For example,

The employer must pay 30% of his employees’social benefits.

Should read:

The employer must pay 30% of his or heremployees’ social benefits.

Another common error in translations is torefer to a company as “she”. In English, acompany is an “it”. Only a ship can be a “she”.

The title Ms is another problem area as it hasno translation in Spanish. But in the modernbusiness world, lawyers must become accus-tomed to addressing any business woman as“Ms” on paper.

8. Register

For a lawyer, it is much safer to keep languageformal, and for most legal writing this is rela-tively easy. The problem arises when writingless formal things because the lawyer withEnglish as a second language finds it harderto judge the level of formality and achieve anappropriate tone. Sometimes the Spanish-speaking lawyer will mix tones, leading to aninappropriate register as in the examples be-low, where the legalism of ‘thereafter’ seemsout of place with the rest of the email, and theformality of ‘deem’ clashes with the friendli-ness of the final salutation ‘cheers’.


1. Original e-mail: a request for work.

Reply: Dear Frank,

I am forwarding a piece of my work inEnglish.

Thereafter I will send you more samples ofsame.

Rgds,

2. Dear Mike,

You can summarize the information in thePower Point slides in the way you deembetter.

Cheers,

I teach lawyers that it is important to empa-thize with your client at all times, so they shouldstart off formally, but if the client becomesmore informal, follow the client’s initiativeand respond in a similar tone while remain-ing consistent and not mixing register.

9. Zero article

While not a plain-English point, this error isso common for Spanish speakers that I felt itwas important to include it here. In Spanish,the definite article is used much more than inEnglish. ‘The’ is often used incorrectly intranslation, which looks very unprofessional.

For example,

The judge defines the public service as theactivity carried out by either the Governmentor the private sector that satisfies the generalneeds.

Should read:

The judge defines public service as an activitycarried out by either the Government or theprivate sector that satisfies general needs.

12. False Friends

False friends are words that sound right, lookfamiliar but have a different meaning whentranslated directly from Spanish to English.While this list is by no means comprehensive,it covers false friends that Spanish-speakinglawyers need to be particularly aware of, assome of them may mean the opposite of whatthey intended.

• Actually means in reality, or en realidad notactualmente.

• Actualmente means now, or at present,currently.

• Adequate translates as suficiente, not adecuado• Adecuado translates as appropriate, correct

or right.

• A billion is a thousand million in English.In Spanish it is a million million.

• Camara de apelaciones translates as court ofappeals not chamber of appeals.

• Carrera translates as studies or degree.• In English, your career is your profession.

• Comply translates as obedecer.• Cumplir can translate as comply with.• You can also use fulfill, perform or carry

out.

• Conveniente should be translated asappropriate.

• Inconvenientes translates as adverse effectsnot inconvenience.

• Comprometerse should not be translated as‘compromise’, but as ‘commit’.

• Compromise means a concession on bothsides.

• Commitment means a promise orundertaking.Although, if you say that ‘information iscompromised’, i.e. it has been leaked, thatdoes translate as información comprometida.

• Derechos politicos when voting in acompany are translated as voting rights.

• Domestic markets should not be translatedas mercados domésticos but as mercadoslocales.

• Doctrine is not an acceptable translation ofdoctrina.

• Use leading commentators, legal authors,scholars or legal text writers.

• Eventually translates as finalmente, noteventualmente.

• Eventualmente is by chance, possibly oroccasionally.

• Explotación económica. The verb exploit iscorrect but it would be incorrect to sayeconomical exploitation. Prefer exploitcommercially.

• Inconsecuente should not be translated asinconsequent which in English meansunimportant. The correct translation isinconsistent. e.g. The ruling wasinconsistent with the Law.


• Imply translates as inferir in Spanish.• Implicar would translate as involve or

implicate.

• Incorporation of a new company is thetranslation of “constitución de una sociedad.

• Incorporación de una sociedad translates asadmission of a new society, e.g. to a groupor joint venture.

• Intimar is a verb meaning to notify,summons, announce or convey an order.

• Do not translate as intimate which is onlyan adjective in English, and means to getclose to someone, in all senses of the word!

• Jurisprudencia should be translated as caselaw not jurisprudence, which is thephilosophy of the law.

• Notorious has a negative connotation inEnglish. e.g. Police officers have been involvedin many of the most nation’s most notoriouscrimes, such as the 1994 terrorist attack on theAMIA. Buenos Aires Herald. Translatenotorio as manifest, evident or well-known.

• Organism is mainly used in English todescribe something biological, whentranslating organismo gubernamental saygovernmental agency, entity or body.

• To pretend means to make out you aresomething you are not and translates assimular. Use intend or in legal Englishpurport to mean that you want or aim todo something, e.g. the applicant intendedto obtain unfair advantage. You may alsouse expect, claim and aim, depending oncontext.

• Relevant adj. means pertinent, or havingdirect bearing on the matter in hand. InEnglish it conveys no sense of urgency orimportance as does the Spanish relevante.

• Último in Spanish has two differentmeanings in English: Fue el último en lacarrera translates as he was the last one inthe race but últimas novedades is the latestnews, i.e. the most recent news.

• Tax haven, not tax heaven, is the correcttranslation of paraíso fiscal and is a countryor state with a lower rate of taxation thanelsewhere. The word haven (pronouncedwith an open ‘a’ as in save,) means a safeport for your savings.

In conclusion, Spanish-speaking lawyers tellme that although they may have particulardifficulties with the language areas describedin this article, they often find it easier to writemore concisely in English than they do inSpanish. In part, this may be because theyare limited by the constraints of writing in asecond language, but also because Englishlends itself more easily to precision. With theguidelines laid down by plain English, theyfind that they can be more easily understoodby their colleagues across the world, particu-larly when using English as a commonlanguage. My aim is that by paying attentionto the ten language points discussed in thisarticle, Spanish-speaking lawyers will be ableto communicate more effectively in the En-glish-speaking business world today.

© JRichardson [email protected]

Joanna Richardson has adegree in Spanish, Portuguese& Latin American Literaturefrom King’s College London. ABritish national, she emigratedto Argentina in 1985, first toSalta, where she set up aninstitute teaching English, andthen to Buenos Aires, where sheworked as a translator. Since2001 she has worked in-houseat Argentina’s largest law firm,Marval, O’Farrell & Mairal,teaching lawyers plain-English writing skills.


Rosa Margarita Galán VélezPresident, the Plain Language Network, Mexico;proud co-organizer of this splendid Conference

María Isabel López SantibáñezProfessor, ITAM

La palabra es nuestra morada, en ella nacimos y enella moriremos (…). Sus muros son transparentesy a través de esas paredes diáfanas vemos al mundo.[Words are our home; in them we are born anddie (. . . ). Their walls are transparent and it isthrough these diaphanous walls that we see theworld.]

—Octavio Paz1980 Literature Nobel Prize

Now more than ever, transparency in languageis a social imperative. With this idea in mind,and driven by an inescapable internationaltrend, in 2005, the Plain Language Networkwas set up in Mexico, the second internationalnetwork after Sweden’s and the first in theSpanish-speaking world. The potential of thisnetwork is enormous and on the rise, particu-larly since Spanish is currently the fourth mostwidely spoken language in the world: today,nearly 400 million speak Spanish in 23 coun-tries, 9 out of 10 of whom are Latin American.

The Plain Language Network is a not-for-profitassociation that provides a neutral, pluralisticperspective for monitoring and promoting theuse of transparent language that will improvethe capacity for communication in Spanish inall social spheres. The Network is an impartialforum, with no links to political parties or pri-vate interests. It is a crossroads and a meetingpoint that encourages discussion and interestin plain language. The Network comprisesprofessionals from various spheres, with verydifferent profiles: academicians, governmentofficials, businessmen and freelance profes-sionals. This variety enriches the network andenables it to influence complementary areas.Despite this diversity, we are linked by ourinterest in language as well as the commit-

ment we have assumed to improving the clarityand effectiveness of communication in Spanish.

In the case of Mexico, although it is true thatthe initiative to promote a plain-languagemovement primarily emerged to improve thecivic-administrative relations of the federalgovernment, we now have a network thatgoes beyond government and is working toensure that plain language permeates thevarious spheres of social and academic influ-ence. An evident proof of this is the effortsthat, with the support of Clarity, led to theorganization of the International Conference“Legal language: transparent & efficient,”which took place in Mexico in November 2008.

One of the most gratifying aspects of thismeeting is that it was attended by representa-tives from around the globe, gathered togetherin this corner of the “Extreme Occident,” asFrench political scientist Alain Rouquié wouldsay. At this conference, we managed to providea fairly consistent overview of plain language,through a variety of representatives: mainlygovernment and legal organizations, academicinstitutions, civil (non-governmental) organi-zations, firms and international organizations.For Mexico, hosting this meeting is the first steptowards genuine cultural change. Neverthe-less, whereas in Mexico we continue to discussthe value of plain language in the construc-tion of a more egalitarian society in whichtransparency will take precedence, other coun-tries have gone beyond this discussion and areexperiencing a change of paradigm in whichcitizens (and their organizations) are evolvingand growing hand in hand with the institu-tions. We obviously still have a long way togo . . . .

Whilst dealing with the issue of the transpar-ency and efficiency of legal language in general,the discussion focused on one aspect that ap-pears to be a fundamental new right: “the rightto understand” and its counterpart: “the obli-gation to be understood.” This last aspect maywell elicit the greatest resistance and justifica-tion of the obscure technical term as a tool oflegal argumentation.

At the meeting, we all agreed, to varying de-grees, that the point is not to create univocalbut rather inclusive laws. We believe that thosethat produce, interpret and apply the law mustbear in mind that it is essential to improveconsistency in the style of expressing legisla-tion, without changing the meaning. It is also

Paths that meet:the plain languagenetwork


essential to improve clarity in the process andapplication of the law without losing sight ofcitizens and rejecting monopolistic, authori-tarian attitudes that enable power to be wieldedthrough language.

In one of the panels, someone raised the fol-lowing question, “How can institutionalstructures be improved so that plain languagebecomes a profession?” We believe that in thisrespect, the school system has a key role toplay, which begins in elementary educationand continues into specific training at the uni-versity level, and even as a specialization withinthe discipline of law, public administration,information sciences and even linguistic studies.In this respect, the Swedish experience hasprovided crucial lessons, not only in the con-ception and implementation of a nationalproject of plain language, but above all, in theway of linking it to the formal education sys-tem, in which there is an academic programthat trains plain-language advisors.

We also discussed, for as long as the confer-ence permitted, the importance of qualitativeand, above all, quantitative research in preciselydelimiting a shared view of what is known asplain language today, and an analysis of the“before” and “after” of its implementation invarious countries and regions and even inspecific projects. This would also enable us toget to the bottom of reflections on the need andrelevance (or not) of establishing internationalstandards of plain language.

The papers at the Conference inevitably ex-tended the original proposal far beyond thepurely legal sphere. They also dealt with anaspect that is now unavoidable: that of newtechnologies. Plain language obviously sharesthe stage with all possible expressions of lan-guage, by which we not only mean the oraland the written, but also the iconic, the graphic,the audiovisual and the typographical. It isno longer enough to inform; one must explic-itly seek to communicate. In this respect, newtechnologies have rapidly contributed tomodifying the structure of language, forcingus to reflect on the new notions of “usability,”“legibility” “iconicity” and “accessibility”that undoubtedly go hand in hand with theissue of transparency in legal language.

Several questions, however, were left in the air.How exactly does one define plain language?What key words does it include? How canone determine its specificity in such a diverse

world? If, in the last analysis, what plain lan-guage seeks is a positive, radical change in theability to communicate by societies and theirorganizations, any effort to reduce the noiseand obscurity of messages is, quite simply,plain language.

The Plain Language Network has taken theinitiative in the Spanish-speaking world to helpachieve this change. As we have seen, the pos-sibilities are infinite and cannot be reduced toa series of formulas but must respond to pre-cise communicative situations, specific needsand the particular spirit or nature of an orga-nization. In any case, the proposals must bedetermined by specific guidelines that willundoubtedly facilitate human exchanges.Perhaps one day we will all be able to look atthe world through diaphanous walls, built ofwords.

© RGalán [email protected]

© MLópez [email protected]

Rosa Margarita Galán Vélezhas been President of the PlainLanguage Network in Mexicosince August 2006. Since 1998,she has been the Head of the Aca-Academic Department of Lan-guages at the InstitutoTecnológico Autónomo deMéxico (ITAM), where she is afull-time teacher. She coordi-nates the Graduate Diploma onProfessional Writing. She hasparticipated in national and international conferences asa speaker of teaching and evaluation of writing. She has aPhD in Education and a Master’s Degree in ComparativeLiterature.

María Isabel López Santibáñez’s professionalexperience has focused on the areas of editing, translationand communication at various public and privateinstitutions. She is currently a full-time professor andlinguistic consultant at the Academic Department ofLanguages at the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo deMéxico (ITAM), as well asmanaging editor of the ForeignAffairs Latinoamérica journal.She holds a BA in Communica-tion Studies and an MA inTranslation and is a doctoralcandidate in French Philology.She was involved in the organi-zation of the InternationalConference on “Legal language:transparent & efficient.”


Salomé Flores Sierra FranzoniDirector for Regulatory Effectiveness at theGeneral Direction of Regulatory Simplification,Ministry of Public Administration in Mexico

The journey of Citizen language

There are several definitions about what plainlanguage is among English-speaking countries.Experts define it as a way of communicatingwhich includes several elements that, com-bined together, allow the intended audienceto focus on the message that it is receiving—understanding and remembering it easily. Amessage stated in plain language should helpthe listener or the reader to trigger any actionwithout complications.

For decades, the Americans, the British andthe Canadians have discussed, written andproposed how to make plain-English workbest. We have seen how, in the US, the plainEnglish movement had strong support at alllevels of government, resulting in interestingsuccess stories. The British did their part asprivate sector organisations demanded govern-ment to clarify some regulations. Canadians,on their account, have a solid developmenton how to apply plain language within a bi-lingual context.

We also have seen plain language at work inother non-English speaking countries. TheMinistry of Justice in Sweden targeted unclearpieces of legislation and complex governmentcommunications to apply plain languagethrough the engagement of high-level man-agement and the development of a clear legalfoundation. Other countries such as Franceand Italy have also taken steps toward thebenefits of applying plain language withingovernment institutions.

But what about plain language in Spanish?On one hand, this is the third most spokenlanguage in the world, after Mandarin andHindu, with over 400,000 million people. Butthere is also another factor as Spanish speak-

ing nations become more developed anddemocratic, their governments demand pro-found reforms and alternative ways ofmanagement. Plain language offers an op-portunity for public officials to do thingsdifferently in order to establish better com-munications and become more productive.

In this context, Mexico created the GoodGovernment Agenda, which included a strat-egy for Better Regulation. This strategy wascreated to help citizens and public servantscomplete their formalities easily, securely andquickly. Citizen Language was created as oneof the tools for improving the regulatoryframework within the Federal Government.

In 2002, the Ministry of Public Administrationstarted developing tools for reviewing, orga-nizing and standardizing the internalregulatory framework of the institutions atthe Federal Public Administration. This exer-cise led us to identify a common problem in thegovernment: official documents were writtenusing a complex and technical language.

The following lines describe some of the ac-tivities that the Mexican government did tostart promoting plain language. These ideasmight inspire other Spanish-speaking coun-tries to start their own plain-language projectsand take the chance of getting clearer andmore precise.

Plain language in Mexico

Back in 2004, the Ministry for Public Admin-istration in Mexico created Citizen Language.This concept encapsulated the basic elementsof Plain English:

• Use clear and simple words,

• Write short (when possible) and concisesentences,

• Structure information logically,

• Use a reader-friendly design that allowsusers to find the most relevant informationeasily.

The journey of Citizen Language


The combination of these elements createduseful communications to citizens and publicservants, allowing them to achieve their ownobjectives easily and rapidly.

The spirit of Citizen Language was to createa cultural change in public servants, incorpo-rating the following values:

1. Efficiency. Clear messages save time andhelp public servants to reduce mistakesor further explanations about the meaningof a text.

2. Transparency. Plain language increasesaccountability and certainty. Access topublic information is not useful if theavailable information is not comprehensible.

3. Trust. Precise communications establishclear expectations for their users.

However, the foremost reason of promotingand using plain or citizen language in Mexicohas to do with rights and obligations. Clearinformation, on one hand, allows citizens tounderstand and exercise their rights and, onthe other, helps them to comply with theirobligations without unnecessary complexitiesor having to pay expensive intermediaries.

Once Citizen Language as a concept wasdefined, it was launched officially with high-level support from the Ministry of PublicAdministration and the President’s Office forInnovation. The following years were dedi-cated to develop handbooks, training sessions,a website (www.funcionpublica.gob.mx/lenguajeclaro) and even an on-line courseand a test for certifying a basic set of skillsand knowledge about plain language. Weaimed to create awareness among public ser-vants of the impact of their writing skills oncitizens and their colleagues.

In 2006, the Ministry of Public Administra-tion led a strategy in which 92 institutionsselected strategic documents, consideringtheir impact on citizens or in several publicinstitutions. The documents were tested withtheir usual readers registering the time theytook to read the documents and the numberof questions or doubts they had after reading

them. After selecting the documents, about6,000 public servants attended seminars oncitizen language and were required to re-write the original documents. To finish thisfirst attempt to apply plain language andtrack the results, we required every institu-tion to test the new documents and comparetheir numbers before and after rewriting thedocuments; we obtained these results:

Number of readers 3,400,000

Number of questions From 18,693 to 4,694or doubts

Number of minutes From 4,381 to 2,300to read

At the end of the year, the Ministry of PublicAdministration awarded prizes to differentauthorities to publicly acknowledge their ef-forts to improve their written communication.These were the first steps taken for creating aplain-language culture in Mexico.

Every person reading this article can decidehow to asses this journey. Some may say it hasbeen a huge development in a short period oftime, and some others may think that this hasbeen an unstructured attempt to create anongoing government program. Perhaps bothperspectives are right; we have done a lotwith relatively little resources, as other plain-language projects in the world have done it.Still, we have not being able to promulgatea legal mandate to institutionalize a plain-language culture which contributes togovernment efficiency and promotes a par-ticipative democracy in which society getsinvolved in government decision-making pro-cesses. But we must insist on promoting plainlanguage, not only in government but in thejudiciary and the legislative branch as well. Aplain language culture should bring a differ-ent meaning to the traditional bureaucraticrhetoric, transforming it into a more efficientand transparent dialogue between public in-stitutions and citizens.

© SFranzoni [email protected]


Salomé Flores SierraFranzoni studied at Univers-idad de las Américas, Puebla,where she got a degree inForeign Affairs. She has aMaster’s Degree in PublicAdministration from theUniversity of Canberra inAustralia.

Salomé is currently working as a Director for RegulatoryEffectiveness at the General Direction of RegulatorySimplification in the Ministry of Public Administrationin Mexico. Carrying on this activity has given her theopportunity to have an intense counseling and teachingactivity addressed to the institutions of the FederalGovernment and also to some state governments in topicsrelated to Good Government and Modernization, specif-ically in internal regulatory improvement and PlainLanguage. She represents Clarity in Mexico and was thekey organizer for Clarity’s third international conference,held in November 2008: “Legal language: transparentand efficient.”

Christine SmithWrite Group, New Zealand

After several years of ground-breaking work,an intellectual property law firm in NewZealand is reaping the benefits of creating aplain-English culture. A J Park’s move awayfrom traditional legal writing was primarily abusiness decision intended to improve clientservice. But as Christine Smith from WriteGroup observes, the benefits haven’t stoppedthere.

Using plain English saves the firm time—andplenty of it. As one of the firm’s executivesexplains, ‘When you take over a file fromsomeone else, it’s easier to understand what’shappened. And because clients can under-stand our advice and instructions more easily,they respond.’

While the number of clients missing deadlineshas dropped, the number of tenders the firmwins has increased. Clients have respondedpositively to the change with comments suchas, ‘This was the first legal document I’veread in years that I could understand’.

Perhaps one of the unexpected benefits is thatthe plain English culture crosses social bound-aries within the firm—it has demystified thework of the executive staff and included sup-port staff. ‘The culture change has pulled ustogether as a firm,’ says one of A J Park’spartners. ‘It’s given us a common goal, acommon standard to strive for. We have somegreat debates about writing now.’

Communicating in plain English differenti-ates A J Park from its competitors. The firm hasreceived significant media attention for its com-mitment to using plain English. That commit-ment was first recognised in the 2006 WriteMarkNew Zealand Plain English Awards when A JPark won Best Plain English Organisation.The awards were judged by an independentpanel of experts including well-known con-sumer advocate, David Russell. ‘The evidence

Leaving legalesebehind

What do you think?Regardless what we print in Clarity,some readers would prefer we takea different direction. For a time, read-ers expressed that they would likethe journal to take a more academicapproach . . . to delve further intotheoretical topics. On the other hand,some readers are turned off by this;they prefer, instead, to read articlesthat are much more practical inscope. Recent editions have tendedto focus on legislative drafting, largelybecause the majority of articles sub-mitted addressed that topic.

The aim of Clarity—the organiza-tion—is “the use of good, clearlanguage by the legal profession.”With that in mind, what path wouldyou like to see the journal take? Doyou have an article you would likepublished? Can you recommendauthors or potential guest editors?No organization or publication cansurvive for long if its members (orreaders) are not gaining something ofvalue. How can Clarity help you?Please contact editor-in-chief JulieClement at [email protected] withyour suggestions and other comments.


services of Write Group, and I started gettingto know around 230 staff working in theAuckland and Wellington offices.

A J Park partners and executives are all law-yers or patent attorneys; many are both.Among them, they have 30 post-graduatequalifications, including 11 PhDs. Over 100managers, secretaries, and clerical staff com-plete a sophisticated, intelligent, and good-humored workforce.

Most of the firm’s science and engineering staffwere specifically trained to write in a scien-tific style. Their documents dealt with highlytechnical subject matter but were often toodifficult to understand for clients who weren’tsubject-matter experts. We needed to find waysto re-train people who were in one respectaccomplished writers, but who had particu-lar writing skills that were unsuited to the jobthey were now doing.

Executives relied heavily on a huge bank ofdocuments, precedents, clippings, and tem-plates stored in the firm’s document manage-ment system. Because the system representsover a hundred years of practice, its contentdidn’t always sit well in modern businessdocuments.

Staff turnover at A J Park is relatively low,and the firm enjoys significant loyalty fromits staff. Because so many of the executivestaff are long-serving, they tended to use andencourage a traditional writing style. Thatstyle was knowledgeable, credible, and au-thoritative, but it didn’t focus on the reader.

Initially, the key message to staff was thatwriting in plain English was not ‘dumbingdown’ but a way to write appropriately forthe intended reader and build client relation-ships.

The understanding from the outset was thatmaking plain English ‘the way we write’ wouldtake time, and we needed to be patient. Thefocus of the training was on finding ways toimprove the standard of writing without be-ing critical of the past.

of cultural change was all there. Their ap-proach is a wonderful model for others tofollow. And they practise what they preach—reading their submission was a breeze.’

In New Zealand recently, the Lawyers andConveyancers Act introduced new client carerules. While some law firms struggled to cometo grips with the rules, A J Park embraced theclient care ethos and developed a client carecharter written in plain English.

The charter received wider recognition bymaking it to the finals in the ‘Best Plain En-glish Document—Private Sector’ in the 2008WriteMark awards. The awards attracted arecord number of entries, and A J Park wasthe only law firm in the finals.

The judges described A J Park’s charter as ‘asignificant long-life document. It shows lead-ership in the profession for providing an equalexchange of information. It reflects the spiritof the legislation by communicating withopenness and honesty and answering antici-pated questions’.

So how does such a significant culture changecome about in a law firm that has been doingbusiness since 1891?

In 2005, some of the firm’s leaders recognisedthe need to move away from traditional legalwriting to writing in plain English. They wereconvinced that the firm could improve thequality of its service to clients by using clear,concise communication, despite the firm’sspecialist area of law being based on techni-cal subject matter and processes.

The leaders realised that for the culture changeto succeed, it needed the support and com-mitment of all the partners. By outlining thebenefits and also highlighting the challenges,the leaders gained 100% partner approval.The mood of the approval ranged from en-thusiastic to passive approval, but there wasno active opposition.

So the firm set out to make plain English ‘theway we write at A J Park’. To help bring aboutthe culture change, the firm employed the


The firm appointed a plain English projectmanager to prepare a project plan to trainstaff, communicate progress, and revise thehuge bank of standard documents. Theproject manager created a brand for theproject and started producing regular inter-nal newsletters with links to the globalplain-English movement. A J Park’s writingstyle guide was updated with modern writ-ing conventions, and the firm introduced aplain-English standard and checklist to helpstaff to change their writing style.

Teamwork was crucial to the success of theproject. Over the years, A J Park and WriteGroup have worked closely to deliver writingtraining for all staff, develop self-paced train-ing materials for A J Park’s new staff, andcarry out user testing on the firm’s key docu-ments. We trained plain-English championswho support the project by promoting plainEnglish, coaching staff, and organising train-ing sessions.

Partners demonstrated their commitment tothe project by being the first to attend work-shops. Executives and support staff followed,

and then the secretaries attended workshops.Executives have found that having the secre-taries trained as well is great. ‘They will oftensay that they haven’t included a word orphrase because it’s not plain English. Andthey’re right. It’s a great back-up when we’reunder pressure and using a Dictaphone.’

These days A J Park is quite self-sufficient inmaintaining its hard-earned plain-Englishculture. My role now is to visit each officeseveral times a year and hold ‘clinics’ to rein-force the plain-English training.

On clinic days, the programme is varied andenjoyable and caters to busy staff. I’m avail-able to meet with anyone who would like to

discuss a document in progress or have pri-vate coaching in a specific area. I lead aone-hour interactive workshop open to ev-eryone in the firm. Topics can include Usinga writing process, or Creating the right tone,or Maximising the flow of a document.

We also offer document critique sessions forsmall groups of executives and support staff.Once staff have a sound knowledge of plainEnglish, a critiquing session is an effectiveway to achieve excellent results in a shorttimeframe. One partner describes this sessionas the ‘best single training activity I have at-tended. The small group allows us to get intodetail.’

standard

letters

user testing

self-paced

training

clinics

champions

plain English

standard

communications

workshops

plain English

culture


The firm has been innovative and smart in itsapproach to creating culture change. Theleaders have always been open to new ideasand never afraid to change direction.

A J Park’s leadership position now extendsbeyond providing specialist intellectual prop-erty advice to clients. In 2007, the firm feltconfident enough in its plain English commu-nication to adopt the strap line ‘A J Park—theclear leaders in intellectual property’.

© CSmith [email protected].

Christine Smith has been aconsultant and trainer withWrite Group since 2003.Christine has pioneered muchof Write’s plain-Englishculture-change work across thepublic and private sectors andhas a particular interest inplain legal language. She hasdelivered workshops for Write’sclients throughout NewZealand and in Washington,Los Angeles, and Mexico.

An energetic and innovative trainer and speaker,Christine can convince even the most skeptical audiencethat plain English is a requirement for any business. Shebelieves the best way to help clients achieve the resultsthey want is to create learning environments that arenon-threatening, interactive, and loads of fun.

Christine began her work with words in 1988 writingadvertising copy at Radio New Zealand. She moved intothe print media in 1992. Her career includes a 9-yearstopover in Dublin where she edited non-fiction, wroteadvertising campaigns, delivered customised writingworkshops, and attended as many workshops at the IrishWriters’ Centre as she could squeeze in to her schedule.

How to join ClarityComplete the application form and send itwith your subscription to your country rep-resentative listed on page 2. For the address,please see www.clarity-international.net/membership/wheretosend.htm.

If you are in Europe and there is no repre-sentative for your country, send it to theEuropean representative. Otherwise, ifthere is no representative for your country,send it to the USA representative.

Please make all amounts payable to Clarity.(Exception: our European representativeprefers to be paid electronically. Pleasesend her an email for details.) If you aresending your subscription to the USA rep-resentative from outside the USA, pleasesend a bank draft payable in US dollarsand drawn on a US bank; otherwise wehave to pay a conversion charge that islarger than your subscription.

Annual subscriptionArgentina 90 ARSAustralia A$50Bangladesh BDT 1500Brazil R50Canada C$40Chile $30Finland ∈35Hong Kong HK$275India 1,000 INRIsrael NIS125Italy ∈35Japan ¥4000Lesotho M100Malaysia RM95Mexico 250 PesosNew Zealand NZ$70Nigeria 2500NPhilippines 1500Portugal ∈35Singapore S$55Slovakia SKK700South Africa R100Spain ∈35Sweden SEK280UK £20USA US$35Zimbabwe US$35Other European countries ∈35All other countries US$35

P

The Plain English Foundationwill host the seventh biennial PlainLanguage Association InterNational(PLAIN) conference in Sydney, Aus-tralia, from the 15th through the 17thof October, 2009. For more informa-tion, visit the conference web page:http://www.plainenglishfoundation.com/tabid/3276/Default.aspx


Dr. Neil JamesExecutive DirectorPlain English Foundation (Australia)

1. A confusing array

We’ve already heard a lot during the confer-ence about the problems with traditional legallanguage. But spare a thought for any of thelawyers schooled in that tongue who decideto do something about it. They might well walkinto a bookshop or a library to see what refer-ences they can find.

Immediately they would be faced with a con-fusing array of titles. There are books ontechnical writing, information design, dis-course analysis, business communications,usability, psycholinguistics, transformationalgrammar, plain English, readability, style andusage. Where does plain language fit into thisbroadening field of communication? Exactlywhich texts should a lawyer turn to for help?

2. Seven traditions of communication

It may be little consolation, but our lawyersare not alone in facing this problem. Commu-nication specialists themselves have troublereaching a firm consensus about their field.

In 1996, J A Anderson surveyed seven majorcommunications texts and identified no lessthan 249 distinct ‘theories’ of communication.Nearly 80 per cent (195) of these appeared inonly one book. Amazingly, only seven per cent(18) were found in more than three of theseven titles.1

So far from being a coherent field with acommon intellectual base, communicationtends to be a series of isolated disciplines thatfor the most part ignore each other. Whichone of these does plain language belong to?

Robert Craig has identified what he callsseven major communication ‘traditions’ andtraced the overlaps and tensions between them:

Rhetorical—communication as practicaldiscourse.

Semiotic—communication as intersub-jective mediation by signs.

Phenomenological—communication asthe experience of otherness.

Cybernetic—communication as informa-tion processing.

Sociopsychological—communication asexpression, interaction and influence.

Sociocultural—communication as the(re)production of social order.

Critical—communication as discursivereflection.2

We don’t have time to traverse all this terri-tory today, but I want to argue that thetradition of most use for the practical prob-lems of legal communication is the rhetoricaltradition. Today, I will outline why this is im-portant and what implications this has forour current debate about plain languagestandards.

3. The rhetorical tradition

Plain language and rhetoric apply to thesame contexts

First of all, the rhetorical tradition is a practi-cal one. Like plain language, it has alwaysoffered audience-focused methods for deliv-ering public discourse to achieve practicaloutcomes.

Rhetoric emerged in the early days of democ-racy in Greece, when any citizen could arguefor a particular action, and being a giftedcommunicator brought you power and influ-ence. The first teachers of public speakingemerged, and became quite the fashion in thefifth century BC. Then a clever bloke calledAristotle developed the ‘techne’ or craft ofrhetoric as a systematic method of communi-cation, and this applies as well to modern

Defining the profession: placing plainlanguage in the field of communication


communication as it did to the classical ora-tion.

Aristotle’s Ars Rhetorica started by outliningthree spheres that rhetoric applied to:

• Deliberative—assessing or acting on publicpolicy.

• Judicial—making legal judgments aboutpast actions.

• Ceremonial—celebrating or commem-orating a public event or person.3

I would argue that most of the examples wewill hear about during the conference fit intoone or other of these categories. Because ofthe explosion of text in the information age,we might add a fourth sphere for purely in-formational documents. But for the mostpart, plain language today applies to thesame scenarios Aristotle identified over twothousand years ago.

Plain language and rhetoric have a similarscope and methods

Of course, having a common context doesn’ton its own place plain language in the rhe-torical tradition. It is the ‘techne’ itself, theprocesses and methods the two have in com-mon, that are of most importance.

By the time of the Roman Republic, the rheto-rician and lawyer Cicero had divided thediscipline into five ‘canons’: invention, ar-rangement, style, delivery and memory.Although these have developed over time, wecan still see the five canons operating in plainlanguage practice today.

Invention relates to our work with content,arrangement to structure, and style to expres-sion. While delivery in classical times meantvocal delivery of a speech, for the moderndocument it now involves the design. Simi-larly, while rhetoric originally offeredtechniques for memorising a long speech, to-day we are more likely to use databases andcontent management systems to achieve thesame ends. The focus has evolved, but theunderlying elements remain the same.

Let’s compare the traditional canons to amodern definition of plain language. Thiscomes from the South African NationalCredit Act:

A document is in plain language if it isreasonable to conclude that an ordinaryconsumer of the class of persons forwhom the document is intended, withaverage literacy skills and minimal creditexperience, could be expected tounderstand the content, significance,and import of the document withoutundue effort, having regard to-

(a) the context, comprehensiveness andconsistency of the document;

(b) the organisation, form and style ofthe document;

(c) the vocabulary, usage and sentencestructure of the text; and

(d) the use of any illustrations,examples, headings, or other aids toreading and understanding.4

(emphasis added)

Traditional canon Traditional application Plain language equivalent

Inventio ‘Discovery’ of arguments Content: accuracy, completenessand logic.

Dispositio Arrangement of a speech Structure: effective sequencing of adocument structure for its purpose

Elocutio Setting the style to a Expression: elements such as wordlevel appropriate to choice, syntax, sentence length,audience and context efficiency and tone.

Pronuntiatio Delivery of a speech Document design: typography, layoutand other visual elements.

Memoria Memorising techniques Databases, manuals, help filesfor long passages of text and content management systems.


4. Six reasons this matters

So the parallels between plain language andrhetoric are very strong, if not comprehen-sive. But is this more than just an intellectualexercise? I want to suggest six reasons thatthis connection matters:

1. It makes our lawyer’s task easier

Firstly, it greatly helps our lawyers strugglingto find the books of most practical applica-tion for their work. These will be within therhetorical tradition rather than books in thecybernetic or sociocultural traditions.

2. It provides strong intellectual foundations

Secondly, placing ourselves in the rhetoricaltradition gives us an immensely rich intellec-tual tradition to draw on. It offers both asound theoretical base and centuries of ap-plied experience to build on. There is no pointin reinventing the wheel when so much is al-ready available. It doesn’t stop us reachingout to other disciplines as well, but we willdo so more effectively working from a soundbase.

3. It helps overcome definitional confusion

Thirdly, it will help us overcome confusionabout what plain language actually is, a diffi-culty that David Melinkoff capturedhumorously when he defined plain languageas ‘an imprecise expression of hope for im-provement in the language of the law’.

The most common definitions tend to take arhetorical approach similar to the one I’vequoted so far. They define plain language bythe ‘elements’ that it works with. One of thebest would be Joe Kimble’s Plain EnglishCharter5, which is divided into sections cov-ering 36 general, design, organisation,sentence and word elements.

However, more recent definitions of plainlanguage are becoming more general, focus-ing on the outcomes plain languageproduces:

A communication is in plain language ifthe people who are the audience for thatcommunication can quickly and easily

• find what they need

• understand what they find

• act appropriately on that understanding.6

The writing and setting out of essential

information in a way that gives a co-operative, motivated person a goodchance of understanding it at firstreading, and in the same sense that thewriters meant it to be understood.7

Now I like both these definitions and I quotethem often. But I have to confess they alsoworry me. They tell us more about whatplain language achieves rather than how itachieves it. This is not far from saying thatanything is plain language if it is good.

At the other end of the spectrum, some prac-titioners define plain language by focusingnarrowly on readability:

Plain Language is language that is easy toread by matching the reading skill of youraudience. Plain language increasescomprehension, retention, reading speed,and persistence.8

If we place ourselves in the rhetorical tradi-tion, we might be able to strike a definitionsomewhere in the middle ground, includingboth outcomes and the elements of focus inthe overall plain language process.

Plain language communication adaptsand tests the content, structure,expression and document design of a textso that its audience can achieve intendedoutcomes.9

This definition may not be quite right either,but I hope to have highlighted the problemwe need to address. We can’t yet call our-selves a coherent field, let alone a profession,while we offer such varying definitions ofwhat we do.

4. It equips us to answer criticism and com-petition

Fourthly, the main danger of an unclear defi-nition is that as practitioners we may findourselves defined out of our own field. Al-ready, adherents of other communicationmodels have wrongly criticised plain Englishfor a narrow focus on expression techniques.If we do not agree on an authoritative defini-tion, these criticisms will recur.

But more recently, there has been growingcompetition for the applied communicationwork that we do. Disciplines such as infor-mation design and usability have emerged ascompeting fields defining themselves with abroader focus that threatens to take over the


territory of plain language. Ginny Redish,one of the pioneers of usability, revealed thisdanger when she said in an interview:

My definition of usability is identical tomy definition of Plain Language, mydefinition of reader-focused writing, mydefinition of document design . . . We’rehere to make the product work forpeople.10

If we do not resolve these definitional bound-aries, plain language’s 15 minutes of famemight rapidly fade. A Clarity conference in20 years time might be talking about informa-tion design instead of plain language.

5. It provides a model for the development ofstandards

Fifthly, rhetoric provides an excellent modelfor resolving these issues. It theorises commu-nication in the exact spheres we operate in. Itsystematically ties together the elements wework with when improving public communi-cation. It offers practical techniques to applywhen doing so, but it stresses a flexible pro-cess rather than fixed, immutable rules. At itsheart is the sovereignty of the audience ineach context to determine the right content,the best structure, an appropriate style, effec-tive design and the right channel forcommunication. It is a sound intellectualmodel that should inform any standards wemight develop.

6. It helps us work at an institutional level

Having this grounding would also help us toset the right institutional framework for theprofession. This includes developing our owninstitutions and interacting with others.

A prime example would be our place withinthe academy. Although plain language train-ing exists at university level in Sweden, this isa rare exception. For the most part, writingcourses at universities are not taught by plainlanguage specialists. Most plain languagepractitioners are outside the academy patch-ing up the communications problems that itperpetuates. Placing ourselves consciouslywithin the rhetorical tradition would give usone means of entering the academy andspreading the work we do at one of thesources of the problem.

5. Institutional structure

Having our intellectual foundations morefirmly placed will also help us develop ourown institutional base, which should includethe following elements:

1. An agreed definition of plain languageand its scope

2. Plain language standards

3. A formal plain language institution

4. Accreditation of practitioners

5. Research activities to develop theprofession

6. Training support for practitioners

Of course, there is an awful lot to be done toget to step number six. But with an interna-tional working group meeting for the firsttime at this conference, the process has be-gun. I am looking forward to hearing fromother panelists who will talk about furtherthese steps. In kicking off the discussion, mypurpose was to flag the importance of start-ing with a clear definition of plain language,but to do so by drawing on a sound intellec-tual tradition.

© NJames [email protected]

Endnotes1 J A Anderson, Communication Theory:

Epistemological Foundations, Guilford Press, NewYork, 1996.

2 Robert Craig, ‘Communication Theory as a Field’in Communication Theory Nine: Two, May 1999, pp119-161.

3 Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric, Translated by HughLawson-Tancred, Penguin Classics, London,1991.

4 For a useful account of the Act, see <http://www.simplified.co.za/default.aspx?link=thinking_legalframework>.

5 Joe Kimble, ‘Plain English: A Charter for PlainWriting.’ 9 T.M. Cooley L. Rev. 1, 1992, pp 11-14.

6 Center for Plain Language, <http://www.centerforplainlanguage.org>.

7 Martin Cutts, Oxford Guide to Plain English,Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1995 and 2004.

8 Impact Information Plain Language Services,<http://www.impact-information.com>.

9 Plain English Foundation, <http://www.plainenglishfoundation.com>.

10 Clifford Anderson, ‘Thumbnail: Ginny Redish’,UPA Voice, June 2005.


Does Clarity haveyour email address?

If you’re willing, would you please sendyour email address to Mark Adler<[email protected]> so that hecan add you to his email list of Claritymembers. We promise not to bombardyou with emails, but from time to timeMark sends out information that shouldbe of interest to members. You will alsoreceive a PDF version of the journal assoon as it’s available.

Dr Neil James is ExecutiveDirector of the Plain EnglishFoundation in Australia, whichcombines plain Englishtraining, editing and auditingwith a public campaign formore ethical language practice.It is also hosting the 2009PLAIN conference in Sydney.Neil has published three booksand over 50 articles and essayson language and literature. Hislatest book, Writing at work, (Allen and Unwin, 2007) ison the language of the professions. He is currently chairof the International Working Group on Plain LanguageStandards.

Argentina

Maria Cristina VignoloMar del Plata

Canada

Jean-Paul ChapdelaineOttawa, Ontario

Chile

Luis BatesSantiago

Carla FirmaniViña Del Mar

Finland

Heikki MattilaHelsinki

Hong Kong

Sunny ChanQueensway

Hong KongPoylytechnique University[Ruth Benny]Hung Hom, Kowloon

Ireland

John MoloneyDublin

Mexico

Gustavo AlejandroEslava SalinasMexico, D.F.

New membersThe Netherlands

Hélène ButijnCulemborg

New Zealand

Crown Law Office[Amelia De Lorenzo]Wellington

Paul MortenWellington

Christine SmithWellington

Peru

Ricardo León-PastorLima

South Africa

Judge Dhaya PillayHyper by the Sea

Connie SmitCape Town

Robyn WynneCape Town

Sweden

Olle HedBromma

Maria HultbergUmea

United Kingdom

Veronica BaileyLondon

Dr. Simon BraytonLondon

John ByrneCambridge

Rebecca ForsterSomerset

Michael HollandDerby

Hope LiebersohnLondon

Simon WesleyLyon

United States

Bruce CorsinoWashington, D.C.

Michael KayeKansas

Helen OsborneMassachusetts

Chris TrudeauMichigan

U.S. SentencingCommission/Library[Jennifer Preston]Washington, D.C.

Miriam VincentColorado


Member news

It is with deep sadness that we report thepassing of Bill Sabin, author of the GreggReference Manual, on January 1, 2009. Readabout his many accomplishments and his in-valuable contributions to plain language athttp://www.villagesoup.com/obits/story.cfm?storyID=141157.

On Thursday, 14 May, the most recent Claritybreakfast meeting was held in London. Clar-ity member Tamara Goriely, of the LawCommission, reported on how legislation onunfair contract terms can promote plain lan-guage in consumer contracts. Attendees alsodiscussed a variety of other plain-languagetopics. Many thanks to Daphne Perry forhelping to coordinate these breakfast meet-ings. Watch Mark Adler’s email alerts formore details about the next meeting, whichwill be held in July 2009. Meanwhile, if youhave ideas about similar meetings in oraround London, contact Richard Castle [email protected].

Clarity member and US Judge Mark P.Painter has been appointed to the UnitedNations Appeals Tribunal, which was createdin 2007 “to help bolster the world body’s sys-tem of dealing with internal grievances anddisciplinary cases.”

Sarah Carr reports that edition 26 of “Pike-staff” is available at http://www.clearest.co.uk. “Pikestaff” is the freenewsletter available from the Plain LanguageCommission. In fact the Commission’swebsite has a wealth of information on thepractical application of plain-language prin-ciples.

Dr K R Chandratre has released the secondedition—improved and enlarged—of Legal &Business Writing in Plain English, published byTaxmann in October 2008. Please tell us whatyou think of this new edition.

Some country representatives for Clarityhave expressed frustration with recruitingnew members. Do you have recommenda-tions? Please help us build Clarity’smembership by sharing your copy of thejournal with interested colleagues, by recom-mending potential members to your countryrepresentative, and by sending the Claritycommittee your ideas for membership recruit-ment. Thank you!

Share your thoughtsRegardless what we print in Clarity,some readers would prefer we take adifferent direction. For a time, readersexpressed that they would like thejournal to take a more academic ap-proach . . . to delve further intotheoretical topics. On the other hand,some readers are turned off by this;they prefer, instead, to read articlesthat are much more practical in scope.Recent editions have tended to focuson legislative drafting, largely becausethe majority of articles submitted ad-dressed that topic.

The aim of Clarity—the organization—is “the use of good, clear language bythe legal profession.” With that inmind, what path would you like to seethe journal take? Do you have an ar-ticle you would like published? Canyou recommend authors or potentialguest editors? No organization or pub-lication can survive for long if itsmembers (or readers) are not gainingsomething of value. How can Clarityhelp you? Please contact editor-in-chiefJulie Clement at [email protected] your suggestions and other com-ments.


From the PresidentChristopher Balmford

Mexico conference a success

A huge “thank you and congratulations” toeveryone involved in organising our Mexicoconference. Extra congratulations and moun-tains of “thank yous”:

• to Clarity’s Mexico representative SaloméFlores Sierra Franzoni who did so much ofthe organising;

• to our co-host Mexico’s Underministry ofPublic Administration—which isresponsible for the Mexican government’sextensive ongoing plain-language activities;and

• to our co-host, the prestigious privateuniversity, ITAM (Instituto TecnológicoAutónomo de México).

From all sorts of people, I have heard muchpositive—indeed, extremely positive—feed-back about the conference and ourwelcoming hosts. Miserably, at the lastminute, I was unable to attend due to per-sonal reasons. My thanks to former Claritypresident Professor Joe Kimble for filling infor me at the last minute.

Next conference October 2010

We are happy to announce that our next con-ference will be in Lisbon. Plain language isjust taking off in Portugal, and this will be agreat opportunity for both seasoned profes-sionals and newcomers to meet and share

ideas. The conferencewill have the supportof the Portuguese BarAssociation.

PLAIN conference,October 2009 in Sydney

If you can’t wait forClarity’s 2010 confer-ence, then October inSydney, Australia is the place to be atPLAIN’s (The Plain Language AssociationInterNational) conference Raising the Stan-dard! The dates are October 15–17, 2009, seehttp://plainlanguagenetwork.org/

Formal link between PLAIN and Clarity

By the way, former Clarity president MarkAdler who is a member of both PLAIN’sboard and Clarity’s committee has been ap-pointed to a liaison role between the 2organisations.

Paying your dues

We continue to research the best (and mosteconomical) online payment arrangement forClarity. I hope to be able to tell you about thissoon. Implementing a system will make lifeeasier for all of us.

Becoming involved in Clarity

The process for appointing the next presi-dent, who is due to take over on 1 January,begins now. We are keen for more people tobe involved. If you’re interested in puttingyour name forward—or someone else’ name,with their consent—do let me know.

PolishMyWriting.com

Raphael Mudge has recently launched a new website, http://www.polishmywriting.com/,which provides the following plain-language aids at no cost to you:

• finds complex phrases and gives suggestions for simple ones• locates the passive voice• roots out hidden verbs (also known as abstract nouns or nominalizations)• searches for redundant phrases and suggests what to drop• finds clichés and bias-language, so you can cut them from your writing

Give this site a try and let us know what you think.


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Clarity , no. 61, p. 4 - Clarity International English for Spanish-speaking lawyers: specific language based issues 20 Rosa Margarita Galán Vélez and ... passed a dime a dozen, the