Language is the fundamental basis for cohesion in all societies — without language, there would be no social order.
For many thousands of years, languages and societies existed independant of one another, and it was probably technological advances related to the development of the wheel which paved the way to bridging the gaps between groups, societies and isolated civilizations in remote areas across the globe. The very plain, simple and straightforward fact that Columbus had no idea he had not reached India is ample proof of the hypothesis that, for most of recorded history, the many disparate civilizations of humanity have — by and large — not come in contact with one another.
“Carriage”: The post chaise [...] used extensively in England during the 19th century [...] provided a faster and pleasanter method of public travel than did its contemporary the stagecoach; average speeds of up to 10 miles per hour could be maintained.
Encyclopaedia Brittanica, 1973
In the span of just a few hundred years, the world has radically changed. Now it is possible to reach almost any place on the globe within about a day, and today any member of this vast multitude of societies can communicate with any other member for about the price of a cup of water. This relatively rapid technological shift has created a situation in which — all of a sudden — many languages have been thrust upon each other and the concept of multilingualism has become a “fact of life”… without any rhyme or reason or plan or any kind of gradual evolution.
Although Martin Luther created the German language about 500 years ago by “translating” the Bible into what he considered to be the way the “regular” people actually spoke, most Germans today will still have difficulty understanding the local dialects in many parts of Germany. Likewise, throughout Europe the situation is one of a multitude of very local dialects, many of which are virtually incomprehensible to their neighboring countrymen (and countrywomen 
).
In contrast, the rapid “settlement” of the North American continent by a small number of relatively homogeneous Europeans gave rise to a vast area of country in which language was a “one-size fits-all” affair. More recently, advances in communications technologies — from the Pony Express to the World-Wide Web — have primarily been developed in this monolingual market in which people have been spread out, few and far between.
As a result, many of the conditions which are endemic to the United States of America — a large and expansive economy spread out over many millions of square miles with only one language and with only minute, insignificant traces of dialect or language variation — have fostered a different kind of communications landscape than almost anywhere else on the globe.
In America, Tom Paine said, law is king. For the masses, Gustave Le Bon said, the ideal is the motivating force. I believe that — although either of these statements may be valid — neither of these statements actually get at the heart of the matter which is so fundamental to the way the American economy and/or economies world-wide actually function today. In my opinion, the presence of a single language acts as a cohesive force, enabling and fostering a national identity. In contrast, the preponderance of multiple languages acts as a disintegrating force, fostering competition among the various sociolinguistic systems. In America, a single language-monopoly is king; In most of the rest of world, competitive dialectic is the rule.
Most obviously, the difference between language monopoly versus competitive dialectics can be observed with the success or failure of slogans within a single language community or across a multitude of language communities. Let me provide a couple of examples.
First and foremost, the success of a slogan depends on the degree of penetration that slogan can attain within a community. So, for example: the “yes, we can” slogan used by Barack Obama in his campaign for presidency was simple and straightforward — so easy to understand that almost anyone on Earth could comprehend the message… and understand that it had something to do with community action and empowerment.
In contrast, I recall a couple years ago in Germany there was a slogan being used by a retailer that went something like “come in and find out”. Although this is a little amusing in English, for those whose native language is German, it could easily be understood as a challenge along the lines of “we’ve built such a good mouse trap that if you come in here, you won’t be able to leave unless you’re able to trace your steps back out of the maze”… and it was — quite understandably — a huge flop.
I propose that in regions of language monopoly it is relatively easy to manipulate public sentiment — and that it is especially easy to influence the sentiment if the language used by a large part of the community is fairly simple and straightforward to begin with. Furthermore, using mass media to train the majority of children to speak one, standardized language, and then also continually training the community in a behavioristic manner — e.g., each time the word “communist” is used, showing a revolting image or prison metaphor — will foster a society which can easily be manipulated to behave in a fairly predictable manner, and in which it is relatively easy to introduce goods and services to a large market of consumers.
In contrast, in regions which are more socially adept (by means of increased awareness of dialectic and a multitude of competitive markets via an increased sensitivity to a multitude of competitive sociolinguistic communities), it is relatively difficult to psychologically manipulate an entire population in any significant way.
I recall that when the Euro currency was introduced, some stated this would be a rather precarious situation for Europe, because they felt that political unification was something like a prerequisite for economic unification. I neither agree nor disagree with this statement, but I feel quite strongly that anyone who expects Europe to behave in a manner that is anything even close to what might be expected behavior in the United States is severely out of touch with the far more intricate socio-politico-economic realities that exist in Europe… and I expect that is also true in many other regions across the globe.
Likewise, in countries where the social cohesion is more similar to that which we see in the United States (e.g. perhaps Japan or Russia), the ability to directly influence the economy via a centralized psychological “manipulation campaign” may indeed have a significant impact on the economies of those countries.
According to this argument, the more coherent, more closed communities of the world are inherently more vulnerable to propaganda, promotion and advertising than communities which are more open to alternative points of view and allow more competitive discourse. This is not a matter of long-standing traditions, but rather a phenomenon that has appeared “all of a sudden” — within the past century… and for the most part: within the past decade.
Governments continue to hold a significant position among the corporate entities which attempt to influence people, but the more language skills that are available to communities, the more immune they will be to such centralized, manipulative efforts. Open, multi-lingual communities may also be more adept at penetrating foreign markets than closed, mono-lingual communities, because of a “comparative advantage” in socio-linguistic human capital already available.
On the other hand, it is quite plausible that language-monopoly markets hold a “comparative advantage” when it comes to the efficiency with which propaganda can be spread throughout the community. For example: consider the extent to which most of the population of the USA were duped into invading Iraq — a feat which was simply unimaginable on the European continent. Such successful decisive and centralized manipulation means that such language-monopoly countries are especially well suited for “top-down” management campaigns (such as military invasions), leadership in economically unviable fields (such as space exploration) and similar autocratic engagements (such as exploitation of natural resources) — in each of these areas, it is quite obvious that the efficacy of propaganda in language-monopoly markets excels far beyond the more “down to earth” rationality of competitive-dialectic markets, perhaps because whereas it is so easy to use a single “one-size fits-all” message to manipulate the former kinds of communities, the latter kinds of communities seem to be much more immune to such simple manipulation.
