Language Rights and Duties in the Evolution of Public Law

Linguistic rights are an original and specific expression of the rights of minorities, which in their turn are part of the universal category of human rights. In recent years jurisprudence, and its relevant institutions throughout the world, have increasingly focused on them. In Europe this is related to the evolution of the nation state, which usually found it hard to tolerate the presence of minority ethnic groups potentially in conflict with the national majority. Today they are experiencing a more recent dimension, linked to the phenomenon of immigration. The analysis is based on a classification of linguistic rights and responsibilities of first, second and third types, corresponding respectively to the integration occurring with the learning of the language of the majority, with the protection of the languages of the historical minorities, and with the (limited) tutelage of the languages of foreigners and their descendents.