All too often, the festschrift consists of a disparate and uneven collection of papers on arange of subjects that often only vaguely intersect with the interests of the individual whose workis being honored by the volume. This is a festschrift with a difference. It consists of a coherentcollection of original papers addressing an area of applied linguistics in which Van Els made hismost outstanding contribution, that of foreign language policy. The collection is given addedcoherence by the fact that most contributors relate their papers to the work carried out by Van Elsand his team on the Dutch National Action Programme on Foreign Languages. Although themajority of the papers describe initiatives in the Netherlands, there are also contributions fromresearchers working in a range of other contexts including Israel, the United States, and Finland.As the editors of the volume point out, the contributions from abroad highlight the internationalimpact of Van Els's work on language policy.