In order to further understand the issue, the writer feels the need to also understand the national policy of a member state which is also a case study. To people who analyze the language policy, France for example has what can be considered to be the most centrist of centrist language policies in the world as what had been mentioned:
“Our linguistic centralism is older and mostly used in the Europe. It is well-known and has been shown by Phillippe le Bel, Francois Ier, Richelieu, Colbert, the Convention, Napoleon, Jules Ferry and others.” - (Catach, 1991).
The idea that centrism can be effective as a language policy rests upon some notions. However, that needs to be examined. Centrism means that decisions are made at the center or in the center of power in the polity (Schiffman, 2000).
As far as France is concerned, the center dichotomy is perfectly represented by the language situation (Schiffman, 2000). At the geographic center of the hexagon is the French language while at the periphery are languages such as Bretagne, le Midi, Corsica, and Alsace where there is almost no region where French is native to the area in France (Schiffman, 2000). The history of France is the history of the spread of French (le francien) out from the Ile de France into these marginal territories of France (Schiffman, 2000).
Dirigisme in French is defined as the attempt to direct and control things from one central place, in particular to centrally direct and control a nation’s economy (Schiffman, 2000). That kind of dirigisme is known as economic centrism. Though France was never part of the Soviet bloc, but the idea of central planning of the economy involved strong state intervention in economic and financial affairs which is going so far as to construct and try to carry out five-year plans, to move and relocate industry around the country and do other kinds of things that are more typical of the Soviet economic model rather than for example, the American model (Schiffman, 2000).
The idea that language could be controlled in this same manner by central decision-making has been around in France for such a long time. It could be traced to the promulgation of the Ordinnance de Viller Cotterets in 1539 (Schiffman, 2000). The French Revolution gave other kinds of intervention on behalf of the language, for example measures to annihilate idioms, patois, jargons, and other kinds of non-standard French (Schiffman, 2000).
The decrees and ordonnances of the Revolution appropriated and perpetuated the monarchic view that language could be controlled from the center where the view that central control of language was just possibly undemocratic as it would be seen in Anglo Saxon countries which has never been part of assumptions about French language policy (Schiffman, 2000).
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