Essentials of Swiss Politics -
for non-Swiss

Direct Democracy

This is maybe the most striking in Swiss politics - And Swiss people often proudly state, that our political system is "the only living direct democracy" in the world - Direct meaning, that main political decisions are taken by a vote of all citizens, and not by a parliament, by ministers or the president.

We, the Swiss population vote up to four times a year on a wide variety of topics: new laws, major government contracts, main planned constructions etc and of course also elections from time to time -

But Switzerland too is of course not a "pure" direct democracy: We have many indirect (representative) elements too and we have parliaments, ministers etc. And there are other Nations and states, which have direct elements too. But it is true, that no other government of that size has so many elements of direct democracy.

For the Swiss system, two direct instruments are key:

1) With an Initiative, any citizen can write his own law, or can write a change to the current law. He will start collecting supporter signatures, and as soon as he gets 100'000 signs, the new law is put up for a vote by all the citizens of Switzerland. If a majority agrees to it, the law is put into place. So, some new laws are set up & decided on without any decision of the parliament.

To be precise more:
a) Technically, only the constitution can be changed, not 'any law'. But as the constitution is above all other law, changes can be made to any law (by simply writing it into the constitution)
b) On a national level, for a law to pass, not just the total count of voters is required, but also a majority of states.
c) The parliament actually gets involved into the process of an initiative in many ways - but it has no right to change anything of the initiative, nor to decide about anything - but it has for example the right to put up an alternative for the initiative. In this case, there will be 3 votes: (1) Initiative (2) Alternative and (3) "If both, initiative & alternative are passed, which one should be implemented?"

2) Referendum: Despite the possibility of the Initiative, most of the laws in Switzerland too, are made by the parliament. However, if a citizen doesn't agree to any law passed by the parliament, he has 100 days time to collect 50'000 signs against this law. If he succeeds, the law will be put for a vote, and if the majority of citizen disagrees with the law, it will never be implemented.

The same system applies in a few more areas, like important contracts with other nations etc.

Federalism

Similar to the US or to India, Switzerland is organized in 3 main layers: (1) the municipals (villages, towns and cities), (2) the states (we call them Cantons), and (3) the Swiss Nation. Federalism means, that a lot of decision power and autonomy stays with the lower levels. By default, decision power stays on a town level, until there is a good reason for centralizing it to the Canton, or even onto a national level.

One of the famous areas are taxes: All three levels have the autonomy to decide about their taxes independently. I have to pay taxes to the city or village of my residency, and the amount differs from village to village. This tax competition usually works out well, as every city is trying to minimize the tax level (as otherwise rich people would move out), by still maximizing the infrastructure & services for the citizen.

The flip side is, that this is misused too: rich people often "officially live" in the village outside a city with the lowest taxes, while they stay mostly in their "second flat" in the city.

Federalism in the direct democratic process means, that Swiss citizen vote on all 3 levels. We vote up to 4 times a year, and mostly about multiple votes for multiple levels at a time: For example a vote about a new national marriage law passed by the parliament, but not agreed by a group of citizens (referendum). At the same time, we may also vote about a new law to limit the salaries of the top management (Initiative Minder) - And on a canton level, we may vote about building a new tunnel or railroad - and on a city level, there may be a vote about a renovation & extension of the public swimming pool - with the effect, that the town taxes will increase by 1.2% ...

Conservative Liberalism

Yes, these two things really go together! - To the surprise & confusion of many outsiders ... Swiss culture is in many areas one of the most conservative cultures, and in other areas one of the most liberal.

Swiss culture may read as: "Be free, live the way you want, do whatever you like, as long as you dont change anything for me ..."

We generally are very liberal in many areas (some famous, some infamous, check the links too): freedom of religion, drug policies, gay rights, economic freedom, suicide laws etc

But in other areas, its very difficult to change old traditions: Switzerland was the last western nation to give female the voting right: On a national level, only 1971 (!!) - some cantons had it earlier, but the last Canton to implement the female voting right was as late as 1990.

It was in Appenzell, a small pre-mountain area. They voted 3 times "no" on it, then the national court forcefully implemented it by deciding, that this was against the Swiss constitution.

Proportional Representation

The US, UK and India have mostly the plurality voting system implemented: For parliament elections for examples, the nation is divided in small districts, and in each of them, one single candidate wins. Every politician, to take office, has to get more then 50% of the votes in his district. This often makes it impossible for smaller parties or for non-mainstream people to enter the parliament.

In Switzerland, as many continental European countries, holds proportional elections: the country is divided in larger areas, and in each area, multiple people are elected. In my area for example, there will be a vote for 17 parliament members. To get one seat in the parliament, a party needs only 6% of the votes.

Our vote area includes about 20 towns: it starts at the suburbs of Zurich, in Opfikon, Walisellen, includes the airport city Kloten, where I live, and goes up til the rural villages at the German border.

The proportional Representation is much better for smaller parties, as well as for "non mainstream" people, like me. If a person & party is able to convince 6% of the people in our area, he is in the parliament.

The elections of course are more complicated in a proportional system: instead of voting for one, you vote for 17 people! - For this, every party prepares a list of 17 people, and the government adds an empty list - Voters then do either:
a) Submit the list of their favorite party unchanged
b) Take the list of their favorite party, erase some names, and replace them with names on other parties
c) Or take the empty list, and fill it up with different people from different parties, as preferred.

The seats are then distributed FIRST to the parties, according to their strength - within one party, the seats are given to the people with the highest votes.