Weakly context-sensitive languages as model for programming languages

Summary An abstract family of formal languages containing context-free languages and properly contained in (deterministic) context-sensitive languages is introduced. This family is comprehensive enough to contain e.g. Algol 60 without admitting too complex recursive constructions possible in the frame of general context-sensitive languages.This family is essentially a family of property-languages, whereby the considered properties are restricted to properties which are constructively definable from a finite number of context-free sets.