ABSTRACT
In the afternoon of 22 November 1972, the delegates of the 35 states participating in the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE)1 were in for a surprise. Arriving for the opening session of the multilateral preparatory talks (MPT) at the Dipoli conference center in Finland, they found that the delegations were seated according to the French alphabet. Although French was one of the official languages of the CSCE, up until that moment the Finnish hosts had consistently used English in the preparations. At the very last minute, however, the Finns had gone to the trouble of reshuffling the seating order and printing new name signs for the delegations in French. In the end, this hasty procedural rearrangement proved to be a permanent solution. The French alphabet prevailed all the way through the conference.
