How do Institutions Work?

The Different Types of Institutions

Institutions are groups of people or countries brought together by a common goal; they try to unite their members to work towards the same end goal whether it is educational, health-related, diplomatic or anything else.

There are different types of institutions operating on different levels: we can mention national, regional, and global institutions, the latter two being very similar. And these institutions also have different fields of action, some are more focused on money and trade such as the International Monetary Fund or the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, others such as NATO are more focused on diplomacy and military issues. Some institutions also work in the humanitarian and educational fields, among many others.

A national institution will only be active in its home country and will not have any influence on foreign matters. On the other hand, a regional or global institution will operate on a greater scale, the most famous regional institution being the European Union.

The European Union has smaller institutions tasked with handling various matters such as the European Parliament, the European Commission or the Court of Justice of the European Union which are all necessary bodies to make sure that the European Union can function smoothly as one entity. However, there are plenty of other regional institutions which operate on a continental level. For instance, in Latin America, MERCOSUR was created to establish an international trade zone and aims to unite its member states by harmonising prices, policies, laws and facilitating trade.

Most institutions active in more than one country can be defined as regional institutions as they are not active all around the world, although some of them tend to try to expand their influence as much as possible to be recognised. Gaining influence is also a key element to ensure that their goals can be achieved and that the message and values they are trying to convey will not be ignored.

The only institution operating globally is the United Nations. Some of its institutions also operate globally like UNESCO or the World Bank but most of its organisations work at a regional level such as the World Health Organisation or the International Criminal Court. UNESCO operates on a global level and in various fields thanks to its different specialised institutions. For example, the International Criminal Court defends victims of war crimes and genocide to try to make sure that the victims of such crimes seek reparation and that the perpetrators face the consequences of their actions.

The Different Needs of Institutions

Each institution works differently which ultimately means that they all have different needs and criteria that need to be met by language service providers whether they work for the institution or as freelance workers.

National institutions are usually monolingual and do not regularly require any translation services. However, some countries such as Belgium, India, South Africa, or Canada have multiple official languages and need translators to make sure that their content is equally available for every citizen.

This task requires translators especially for administrative and legal matters with a language combination that may be specific to a single country; for example, translation between English, Zulu, and Xhosa in South Africa is very important but it is probably only needed there. Such countries might also need interpreters to translate official speeches or statements made in parliaments or official courts.

Organisations such as the European Union require both interpreting and translation depending on the institutions. For example, the European Parliament requires a lot of interpreters to translate the speeches on different topics delivered by people from various European countries. On the other hand, the European Commission will rely on translators to translate written documents. Although it does not operate on a global scale, the European Union needs a lot translators and interpreters to cover the 24 official languages and 552 possible language combinations.

Some other important organisations have very different needs; MERCOSUR, which also operates on a continental scale very much like the European Union, has a very limited need for translation and interpretation as most of its members speak Spanish. The only need for translation and interpretation is to cover interactions between the Spanish-speaking members of the organisation and Brazil where a dialect of Portuguese is spoken. In this case, the need for translation is just as important as before but it is much easier to properly provide as there is only one language combination involved.

Besides the need for various language combinations, institutions also have various specialisation needs. It’s obvious that the International Criminal Court, UNESCO, and the European Parliament will have very different needs because they operate in very different fields. This implies that the same translator will not usually be called to carry out a translation for all these institutions. This can be explained because, just like institutions, translators tend to have their area of expertise which allows them to provide high-quality translations. This is especially true if they work in a field where the stakes can be quite high such as legal translation which requires a translator who is knowledgeable about the legal systems of multiple countries and where a mistake can have harmful consequences.

Specialised language service providers will also be more efficient and accurate on a given topic which will spare the institutions a lot of issues. They will also prove to be quite useful to help write glossaries and style guides that can be used by other translators or interpreters from the institution to carry out tasks as accurately as possible.

To ensure that translations are high-quality and will not present any liable issues or inaccuracies, institutions also tend to use editors. Their job is to check the quality of the translation by removing and correcting any mistake that could have gone unnoticed by the translator during the initial translation process.

In conclusion, we can see that there are plenty of institutions out there with very diverse needs, so every translator or interpreter can find an institution to fit their ambitions and specialisation.

LE FURAUT Nolwenn

M1 TSM 2022-2023