# hinter den bestehenden europäischen Konsens zurückgefallen



## Kraus

Hello friends! Could you please help me translating the following sentence?

"Das Europaparlament is heute hinter den bestehenden europäischen Konsens der EU-Grundrechtecharta und der Rechtssetzung in der Biopatentrichtlinie zurückgefallen". I've some doubts about the expression "hinter den Konsens zurückfallen"; what does it mean?


Thanks in advance for your help!


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## starrynightrhone

Hello Kraus,
it means that they have reached a consensus some time ago, but that they now "fell behind it", meaning that they are now neglecting it. So basically things are not improving but deteriorating.


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## Kraus

Thanks a lot Starrynightrhone!  
So is it kind of "Today the European Parliament is neglecting the present European consensus about the European Constitution etc"?


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## starrynightrhone

Exactly, that's how I'd interpret it 

That's a tough sentence to translate vocabulary wise, but maybe someone knows a link to a good online German-English dictionary specialized in legal terms...

Here's my attempt (minus the words I don't know, I'm sorry ):

"Today the European Parliament neglected the present European consensus laid down in the Charter of Fundamental Rights and of the decision-making ("_Rechtssetzung"?)_ concerning the _Biopaten_ directives." 

I'm afraid I don't even know what exactly is meant by the term "Biopatenrichtlinie". I'm sorry.


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## I.C.

“Fell short of”, I would guess.


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## cyanista

Perhaps "failed to adhere to..." would sound more neutral than "neglected"?


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## starrynightrhone

I.C. said:


> “Fell short of”, I would guess.


 
You mean I can't use "fall behind" for "zurückfallen"? Or "fall back" or "relapse"? 

"To fall short" means IMO more "zurückbleiben", "nicht entsprechen/erfüllen".

"He fell short of her expectations", for instance, means "Er konnte ihren Erwartungen nicht entsprechen". 




> "Perhaps "failed to adhere to..." would sound more neutral than "neglected"?


 

Thank you Cyanista, that sounds indeed nicer


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## cyanista

By the way, it's Biopaten*t*richtlinie, Starry.  (See post 1.)



starrynightrhone said:


> I'm afraid I don't even know what exactly is meant by the term "Biopatenrichtlinie". I'm sorry.


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## starrynightrhone

Oh dear. I should learn to read more carefully 

So I guess the correct translation would be

"the decision-making of the *Biopatent Directive*"?

What would you say?


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## I.C.

starrynightrhone said:


> You mean I can't use "fall behind" for "zurückfallen"? Or "fall back" or "relapse"?
> 
> "To fall short" means IMO more "zurückbleiben", "nicht entsprechen/erfüllen".
> 
> "He fell short of her expectations", for instance, means "Er konnte ihren Erwartungen nicht entsprechen".


Far be it from me to tell you what you can or can’t use… 

“The Sinn Fein chairman said if the document - expected to be submitted to the Northern Ireland political leaders by the middle of next week - fell short of the Agreement, it would not be acceptable.”

(source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/1451167.stm )

“"We regret that this first round of the elections fell short of the standards to which Armenia has committed itself in OSCE documents," the statement said.”

(source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/66822.stm )


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## starrynightrhone

Well, thank you for these examples I.C., that's certainly un usage I didn't know of. Learned something new


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## cyanista

Your examples indeed look very convincing, I.C. 



starrynightrhone said:


> So I guess the correct translation would be
> 
> "the decision-making of the *Biopatent Directive*"?
> 
> What would you say?


I'm not sure. I would tend to interpret "Rechtsetzung" as _legislation/codification_ and "Richtlinien" as _guidelines_ nut I'm no lawyer...

My current suggestion would be: 
_Today(,) the European Parliament has fallen short of the existing European consensus between (?) the Charter of Fundamental Rights and the codification of the biopatent guidelines.
_ 
I'm going out on a limb and using "between" but I'm not at all clear about the meaning of "Konsens der EU-Grundrechtecharta und der Rechtssetzung in der Biopatentrichtlinie". Help!


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## starrynightrhone

I'm really a little at my wits end with this one... 

Personally I wouldn't use the "between", because the way I understand it the European Parliament has fallen behind of _both _the Charter of Fundamental Rights and of the lawmaking of the biopatent directives.

(I found this page that translates "Rechtssetzung" with "lawmaking":
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/...IPR08065-16-05-2006-2006-false/default_en.htm, you can switch between German and English) 

I remember from my studies that a "Richtlinie" is a "directive" in legal English (not a "guideline"), but the language of the law really is a science for itself- in any language. In German we have a saying: Deshalb möchte ich mich hier nicht zu weit aus dem Fenster lehnen


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## Kajjo

Kraus said:


> "Das Europaparlament is heute hinter den bestehenden europäischen Konsens der EU-Grundrechtecharta und der Rechtssetzung in der Biopatentrichtlinie zurückgefallen". I've some doubts about the expression "hinter den Konsens zurückfallen"; what does it mean?


It means that the parliament returned to a policy that is weaker, worse or in this case less protecting than the current consensus. They fell back to times that the author had hoped were history. (By the way, it does not at all mean "neglect".)

Kajjo


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## starrynightrhone

Kajjo said:


> They fell back to times that the author had hoped were history. (By the way, it does not at all mean "neglect".)


 

The "neglecting" is implied when they fall back to a weaker policy. They reached an agreement, but later failed to adhere to it (as cyanista so nicely puts it).


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## Kajjo

starrynightrhone said:


> The "neglecting" is implied when they fall back to a weaker policy. They reached an agreement, but later failed to adhere to it (as cyanista so nicely puts it).


Yes, this might be the case, but it is only implied by the sentence. We would need more context to decide this. It could be the case that the parliament _consciously and willingly decided to return to a pre-consensus policy_ for whatever political, lobbyistic reasons. This is guesswork.

Linguistically, it just means to go back to pre-consensus time. That's all.

Kajjo


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## starrynightrhone

Kajjo said:


> Yes, this might be the case, but it is only implied by the sentence. We would need more context to decide this. It could be the case that the parliament _consciously and willingly decided to return to a pre-consensus policy_ for whatever political, lobbyistic reasons. This is guesswork.


 
IMHO "neglecting" doesn't necessarily imply consciousness/ unconsciousness or intentionality. 




Kajjo said:


> Linguistically, it just means to go back to _pre-consensus time_. That's all.


 
What does that mean? To me it means not to achieve or to neglect the standards set by this consensus. The going back in time is only a metonymy. This interpretation seems obvious to me, even without further context. Besides interpreting language to a certain extend always involves drawing inferences and thus "guesswork". Otherwise this forum wouldn't exist and we wouldn't have a fun time arguing about linguistic "trivia".


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## Kajjo

> What does that mean? To me it means not to achieve or to neglect the standards set by this consensus.


Well, if the parliament set those standards, it may change them back to previous policies -- and we should not call that neglect -- at least as far as my dictionaries translate _neglect_. 

Again, it might be neglect, but we just don't know. We should explain the German meaning as clear as possible and let everyone draw his own conclusions. We may state our conclusions, but I would favor to clearly distinguish between those conclusions made by language knowledge and those made by guesswork.

Kajjo


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## gaer

cyanista said:


> Perhaps "failed to adhere to..." would sound more neutral than "neglected"?


Absolutely, and more natural too. "The word I thought of was "slack", as in "slacking", but this is very informal. Not keeping pace with, not keeping up with…

"failed to keep in step with"

I sort of like the last one. What do you think? I'd like to keep the idea of "falling behind", but that is impossible to do with any kind of literal translation, I think.


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## Kraus

Thanking everybody for your efforts, I give you some more context and hope it helps:

"Nur der Vorschlag des EP-Rechtsausschusses (Berichterstatterin Breyer), menschliche embryonale Stammzellen aus dem Geltungsbereich der Verordnung herauszunehmen, hätte Rechtsklarheit und Rechtssicherheit geschaffen. Der Verdacht hat sich erhärtet, dass Vertreter der Bundesregierung via Europäische Union die deutsche Stammzellgesetzgebung aushebeln wollen. Die jetzt vom Europaparlament grundsätzlich unterstützte Ausnahmeregelung der EU-Kommission ist nicht gerichtsfest. 
*Das Europaparlament ist heute hinter den bestehenden europäischen Konsens der EU-Grundrechtecharta und der Rechtssetzung in der Biopatentrichtlinie zurückgefallen* und macht sich zum Türöffner der Kommerzialisierung des Menschen. Es bleibt zu hoffen, dass andere EU-Mitgliedstaaten im Rat den Mut haben werden, die heute eingeläutete bioethische Rutschbahn aufzuhalten und eine Kehrtwende einzuläuten."


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## Sepia

Why don't you just check up on who actually signed this charta "* EU-Grundrechtecharta". 
*Then you'll also know what it is they are falling behind. Obviously representatives of the memeber states' governments aggreed upon a set of standards, and now the Commission has presented a proposal for a directive, but after being debated and voted upon in the European Parliament etc., what came out in the end was a directive that does not meet the standard of the charta. Whatever the charta is you can probably pick up a copy for free at your local European Info Point. If you cannot find one, PN me an tell me your location, and I can find out where you'll get it.


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## cyanista

Extensive context always helps. In this case the best solution would be to read the whole article. 

The given paragraph makes it clear that the article is concerned with stem cell research.

Some quotes in German:


> Charta der Grundrechte
> 3.2. Im Rahmen der Medizin und der Biologie muss insbesondere Folgendes beachtet werden: �
> <...>
> das Verbot, den menschlichen Körper und Teile davon als solche zur Erzielung von Gewinnen zu nutzen <...>





> Das Europäische Patentübereinkommen und die Biopatent-Richtlinie der EU verbieten Patente „gegen die guten Sitten“ (Artikel 53a). Darunter fallen Patente, bei denen Embryonen zu industriellen und kommerziellen Zwecken verwendet werden. Source


I suppose it makes it sufficiently clear what standards are seen as violated. 

My final version reads as follows:

_The European Parliament failed to keep in step with__ the present European consensus manifested in the Charter of Fundamental Rights and in the legislation implementing the biopatent directive._


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## Jana337

cyanista said:


> My final version reads as follows:
> 
> _The European Parliament failed to keep in step with__ the present European consensus manifested in the Charter of Fundamental Rights and in the legislation implementing the biopatent directive._


 I like this.

Other thoughts: Strayed from the current Eurpean consensus, overrode the consensus. But they do not convey a negative impression.

Edit: One more - departed from the current consensus.


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## se16teddy

Further to IC and Cyanista's ideas, maybe _The European Parliament today failed to live up to the existing European consensus enshrined in the ..._?


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## Jana337

Can you live up to a consensus?  So far, I've always seen it with pledges, promises, commitments, hopes, expectations etc.


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## Whodunit

Jana337 said:


> Can you live up to a consensus?  So far, I've always seen it with pledges, promises, commitments, hopes, expectations etc.


 
Although I'm by far not as familiar with these terms as you, Jana, I agree with you that _to live up to a consensus_ doesn't seem very common. Does it make much sense at all?

Nevertheless, here are two examples with _to live up to a consensus_:



> This was because strange individuals that did not live up to the moral consensus were removed from the group. *Source*


 


> As Carroll finds that psychometrics is a sound and fair-minded scientific discipline, he undertook the task to re-examine the six propositions that Herrnstein and Murray stated as being beyond significant technical dispute in psychometric research, to see whether they in fact live up to the current consensus among most experts. *Source*


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## cyanista

One of the meanings of _live up to_ is "carry out, fulfill" (Dictionary.com). 

"Living up to a contract/an agreement/a standard" seems to be quite common on the Net.


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## Sepia

se16teddy said:


> Further to IC and Cyanista's ideas, maybe _The European Parliament today failed to live up to the existing European consensus enshrined in the ..._?


 
I personally find this is the best one.

Reason:

Most of the others leave the impression that the European Parliament actively did something either violated or underminded the standards the mentioned charta. 
This of course is not the case! That is not the way legislative business is being done in the EU. What must have happened - because that is the way business is done - is that a directive was presented by the E. Commission for processing in the EP. There they have eventually voted and turned it down. Or, after debating it, it was returned to the Commission to be worked over and a "weaker" version was eventually aggreed upon in Parliament.
So it must simply be more about what they did NOT do, than what they did.


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## se16teddy

Jana337 said:


> Can you live up to a consensus?  So far, I've always seen it with pledges, promises, commitments, hopes, expectations etc.


According to the Oxford English Dictionary (meaning 4fb of live (verb 1) you _live up to_ 'principles, rules, etc'.  I suppose the issue is whether the consensus in question amounts to 'principles'.  I have, though, found the expression _lived up to that consensus _here (4th line of the text). http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,917626-4,00.html


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