INTRODUCTION

Switzerland has a long republican tradition, its modern democratic

constitution dates back to 1848 only, however, and was put into effect after
a short civil war in 1847 leaving a conservative minority in a position of
losers for decades. The constitution was totally revised in 1874 and
amended organically from time to time since. The 1999 total revision did
not change anything of importance in substance, it's sole purpose was to
establish a modern and more readable structure and language (there have
been more substantial changes in small revisions of single items in the last
five years than between the "old" and the "totally revised" constitution).

The federal constitution defines Switzerland as a Federal State Composed

of 26 cantons (until 1976 only 25 cantons were present) with far reaching
autonomy. For historical reasons, six of the 26 cantons count as half-
cantons (created by splitting three originally united cantons in two
autonomous halves each), so the total number of 23 cantons given in some
other sources is also correct in a way.1 Apart from voting arithmetics in
referendums and in the small chamber of parliament, the half-cantons have
exactly the same status as full cantons. However, Switzerland’s
government, parliament and courts are organized on three levels:

 Federal
 Cantonal (based on 26 cantonal constitutions)
 Communal (in a few small cantons and in some 2500 small villages
reunions of all citizens are held instead of cantonal and communal
parliaments; local courts are usually common to several communities)

The federal constitution in principle reserves the areas of foreign relations,

the army, customs examinations and tariffs, value added taxes and the
legislation on currency, measure and weight, railways and communications
to the confederation. On the other hand only the cantons (and some major

1 Switzerland’s Political System and Government, available at http://swiss-government-

politics.all-about-switzerland.info/ (Last Visited on 02-03-2014)

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cities) do have armed police forces, run hospitals and universities (with the
exception of two federal institutes of technology). Legislation on public
schools is made by the cantons, resulting in 26 different education systems,
but the public schools are actually run by the communes, much like many
other public services (like water supply and garbage collection). The
confederation, the cantons and the communes do collect income taxes to
finances their affairs.

When it comes to the details, everything is just a little bit more complex in
Switzerland's political system, however, because in almost any field of state
activity federal legislation does try to establish a minimal amount of national
standard on one side while leaving a respectable amount of self-
determination to cantons and communes on the other side. A majority of the
electorate does reaffirm this basic principle of Swiss politics over and over
again by rejecting centralistic laws and accepting federalist laws in
referendums.2

While Switzerland's electorate has more rights of participation than in any

other country and makes extensive use of them, women's right to vote was
introduced relatively late in Switzerland: In 1959 a first canton introduced it
on cantonal and (within its territory) on communal level on the very day a
67% majority of the national male electorate rejected the introduction on the
national level. Only in 1971, women got the right to vote on national level
and the last canton was forced by the federal court to introduce it on
cantonal and communal level as late as 1990 (referring to a 1981
amendment of the federal constitution that explicitly grants equal rights to
men and women).

2
Id

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 OBJECTIVES

 To understand the concept of Political Party.

 To critically examine the origin of Swiss Political Party.
 To analyze it’s implication over the Switzerland Political System.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The researcher has used the analytical and descriptive research methodology in this
project to understand the concept of Swiss Political Party.

SOURCES OF DATA

The researcher has used Primary and Secondary sources of data while making this
project. These sources include:

 Bare Act
 Books
 Law Journals
 Articles available on the internet.

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 CHAPTER 1: MEANING AND ROLE OF POLITICAL PARTIES

Human beings have always organized themselves in groups and larger

formations. Political parties have emerged as one of these human
organizations. In modern age the ideal form of government is run through
one or the other method of representative institutions. All representative
governments and representative institutions require the existence of political
parties.
A political party is an organized body of people who share certain common
principles and goals regarding the political system of a country. The main
purpose of political parties is to acquire and retain political power. Political
parties which run the government are called the ruling party. In a coalition
government, there may be more than one ruling party. Those who sit in the
opposition and criticize and analyze the performance of the ruling party/
parties generally or on specific issues are called opposition parties. A
political party as such should have the following essential features:
i. It must be an organized body of people with a formal membership;
ii. It must have clearly spelt out policies and programmes;
iii. Its members should agree with its ideology, policies and programmes;
iv. It must aim at getting power through the democratic process;
v. It must have a clear and acceptable leadership; and
vi. It must focus on broad issues and major areas of government policies.

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 CHAPTER 2: MAJOR POLITICAL PARTIES OF SWITZERLAND

Switzerland has a multi-party system. Since 1959, the four

largest parties have formed a coalition government, according to a
"Zauberformel" or "Magic formula". This arithmetic formula divides the seven
cabinet seats among representatives of the four largest parties. Switzerland
has a rich party landscape. The five parties represented in the Federal
Council are generally called the government parties: Free Democratic
Party, Social Democratic Party, Christian Democratic Party, Swiss People's
Party, and Conservative Democratic Party of Switzerland.3

2.1 Swiss People’s Party:

The Swiss People's Party, also known as the Democratic Union of the
Centre, is a conservative political party in Switzerland. Chaired by
Toni Brunner, but spearheaded by Christoph Blocher, the party is the
largest party in the Federal Assembly, with 58 members of the
National Council and 6 of the Council of States. The SVP was founded
in 1971 by the merger of the Party of Farmers, Traders and
Independents (BGB) and the Democratic Party, while the BGB in turn
had been founded on the background of the emerging local farmers'
parties in the late 1910s. The SVP initially didn't witness any
increased support beyond that of the BGB, remaining at around 11%
of the vote through the 1970s and 1980s. This changed however
during the 1990s, when the party underwent deep structural and
ideological changes under the influence of Christoph Blocher, turning
the party to become the strongest party in Switzerland by the 2000s.4

2.1.1 History of Swiss People’s Party:

The early origins of the SVP goes back to the late 1910s, when
numerous cantonal farmers' parties where founded in agrarian,
Protestant, German-speaking parts of Switzerland. While the Free
Democratic Party had earlier been a popular party for farmers, this

3
Ladner Andreas (2007) Handbook of Swiss Politics, 2ns edition. Zurich p. 95
4
id

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 changed during World War I when the party had mainly defended the
interests of industrialists and consumer circles.[6] When proportional
representation was introduced in 1919, the new farmers' parties won
significant electoral support, especially in Zurich and Bern, and
eventually also gained representation in parliament and government.
In 1936, a representative party was founded on the national level,
called the Party of Farmers, Traders and Independents (BGB). During
the 1930s, the BGB entered the mainstream of Swiss politics as a
right-wing conservative party in the bourgeois bloc. While the party
opposed any kind of socialist ideas such as internationalism and anti-
militarism, it sought to represent local Swiss traders and farmers
against big business and international capital.
In 1991, the party for the first time became the strongest party in
Zürich, with 20.2% of the vote. The party broke through in the early
1990s in both Zürich and Switzerland as a whole, and experienced
dramatically increasing results in elections. From being the smallest
of the four governing parties at the start of the 1990s, the party by the
end of the decade emerged as the strongest party in Switzerland. At
the same time, the party expanded its electoral base towards new
voter demographics. The SVP in general won its best results in
cantons where the cantonal branches adopted the agenda of the
Zürich-wing. In the 1999 federal election, the SVP for the first time
became the strongest party in Switzerland with 22.5% of the vote, a
12.6% share increase. This was the biggest increase of votes for any
party in the entire history of the Swiss proportional electoral system,
which was introduced in 1919.
The SVP thus formed the first opposition group in Switzerland since
the 1950s, and in 2008, the two former SVP Federal Councillors
joined the newly founded Conservative Democratic Party (BDP), largely
centered around Bern.5

5
Gerhard Robbers (2007) Encyclopedia of World Constitution, Facts on File Incorporation
Publication, New York, p. 876

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2.2 Social Democratic Party of Switzerland:
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland also rendered as Swiss
Socialist Party is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland.
The party was founded on 21 October 1888, and is currently the
second largest of the four leading coalition political parties in
Switzerland. It is the left-most party with representatives in the Swiss
Federal Council. It is also the second largest political party in the
Swiss parliament. The current members in the Swiss Federal Council
are: Micheline Calmy-Rey and Simonetta Sommaruga. The SP is the
biggest pro-European party in Switzerland and supports Swiss
membership of the European Union, unlike most other Swiss parties.

2.2.1 Policy of Party:

In economic, financial, and social welfare policy, the SP rejects policies

of economic liberalization such as deregulation, lowering taxes for
high-income citizens, and decreases in government spending on social
insurance. The SP also opposes raising the retirement age. In
addition, the SP is a proponent of increasing welfare spending in some
areas such as for a publicly financed maternity leave, universal health
care and a flexible retirement age. In tax policy the SP opposes the
notion of lowering taxes for high-income citizens. By campaigning for
the harmonization of all tax rates in Switzerland, the SP seeks more
redistribution. The SP is skeptical toward the privatization of state
enterprises. Nonetheless, the SP also promotes more competition in
the areas of agriculture and parallel imports.

2.3 Christian Democratic People’s Party of Switzerland:

The Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland is a Christian
democratic political party in Switzerland. It is the fourth-largest party
in the National Council, with 31 seats, and the largest in the Council
of States, with 15 seats. It has one seat, that of Doris Leuthard, on the
Swiss Federal Council. The party was founded as the Catholic
Conservative Party in 1912. The party peaked in the 1950s, having
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 three members of the Federal Council (1954–58) before agreeing to the
Magic formula. It adopted its current name in 1970. From 1979 to
2003, the party's vote declined, mostly at the expense of the Swiss
People's Party, and the party was reduced to one Federal Councillor at
the 2003 election. The party sits in the centre of the political
spectrum, advocating Christian democracy, the social market
economy, and moderate social conservatism. The party is strongest in
Catholic rural areas, particularly Central Switzerland and Valais.. The
party is a member of the Centrist Democrat International.
2.3.1 History:
In 1912 the Catholic-Conservative Party of Switzerland was founded.
From 1919 on, the party occupied two out of the seven seats in the
cabinet. Aided by the political climate of the postwar period, the party
experienced its peak in the 1950s: It was represented by the biggest
parliamentary delegation in the national assembly, and from 1954 to
1958 the party occupied three out of seven seats in the cabinet.
Nonetheless, the party had to relinquish the third seat in favor of the
'Magic formula', which was introduced to the cabinet in 1959. In 1957
it changed its name to the Conservative-Christian-Social People's
Party and to its current name in 1970. In the ensuing decades, the
Catholic voter base dissolved somewhat. The reduction of the voter
base, in addition to less cohesion among politicians in the party, led to
six successive losses in federal elections after 1980. Beginning in the
1990s, conservative voters from former strongholds of the CVP have
switched to vote for the right-wing populist Swiss People's Party. Due
to that voter switch and the resultant 2003 national elections to the
national assembly, the party lost their second seat in the governing
Federal Council, retaining only one of the seven seats.

2.4 Green Party of Switzerland:

The Green Party of Switzerland is the fifth-largest party in the
National Council of Switzerland, and the largest party that is not
represented on the Federal Council.

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2.4.1 History:
The first Green party in Switzerland was founded as a local party in
1971 in the town of Neuchâtel. In 1979 Daniel Brélaz was elected to
the National Council as the first Green MP on the national level. Local
and regional Green parties and organizations were founded in many
different towns and cantons in the following years. In 1983, two
different national green party federations were created: in May, diverse
local green groups came together in Fribourg to form the Federation of
Green Parties of Switzerland, and in June, some left-alternative groups
formed the Green Alternative Party of Switzerland in Bern. In 1990, an
attempt to combine these organizations failed. Afterwards, some of the
member groups from the Green Alternative Party joined the Federation
of Green Parties which has become the de facto national Green party.
In 1993, the Federation of Green Parties changed its name to the
Green Party of Switzerland.6
In 1986 the first two Green members of a cantonal government
become members of the Regierungsrat of Bern. In 1987, the Green
Party of Switzerland joined the European Federation of Green Parties.
In the 1990s, members of the Green Party became town mayors,
members of the high court and even president of a cantonal
government.
2.4.2 Policies:
The traditional emphases of the party's policies lie in
environmentalism and green means of transportation. In terms of
foreign policy, the greens set out on the course of openness and
pacifism. In economic policy, the greens are center-left. The majority
of greens support an accession of Switzerland to the European Union.
In immigration policy, the greens support further integration
initiatives for immigrants. The greens support measures to increase
energy efficiency, oppose nuclear power, and support raising energy

6
Gerhard Robbers (2007) Encyclopedia of World Constitution, Facts on File Incorporation
Publication, New York, p. 876

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 and fuel prices. According to their policy, the resulting revenues
should be allocated to social security spending.

2.5 Green Liberal Party of Switzerland:

The Green Liberal Party of Switzerland is a centrist Green liberal
political party in Switzerland. Founded in 2007, the party holds five
seats in the Federal Assembly. The party was formed on 19 July 2007
by four cantonal branches of the Green Party. Contesting the election
in October 2007 in St. Gallen and Zurich, the party won three seats in
the National Council. A month later, the party won a seat in the
Council of States, with Verena Diener representing Zurich. The party
has since expanded across Switzerland, and holds seats in thirteen
cantonal legislatures in German-speaking Switzerland and the
Romandy.
The Green Liberals are a party of the political centre or centre-right,
as opposed to the left-wing Green Party. They seek to combine
liberalism on civil liberties and moderate economic liberalism with
environmental sustainability. In the Federal Assembly of Switzerland,
the glp is part of the centrist Christian Democrats, along with the
Christian Democratic People's Party and Evangelical People's Party.
2.5.1 History
The party was founded on 19 July 2007 by four cantonal parties of
the same name that had seceded from the Green Party. These
branches were in Basel-Landschaft, Bern, St. Gallen, and Zurich. In
the 2007 election to the National Council on 22 October 2007, the
party ran in Zurich and St. Gall. Despite being limited to only two
cantons, the party won 1.4% of the popular vote nationwide and 3 out
of 200 seats. In Zurich, they won 7% of the vote. One of these three
had been a National Councillor for the Green Party in the previous
Parliament.7

7Satori,
Giovanni (1976). Parties and Party System: A Framework for Analysis. Vol. 1.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 587

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 CONCLUSION

The federal constitution provides for political parties to help give form to the
opinions and will of the people. A number of different political parties,
competing for the favor and the votes of the public, exist in the country. In
the 2003 elections, the four major parties gained the support of around 80
percent of the electorate.8

For a long time, the Swiss party system was regarded as the epitome of
political stability. Shifts in votes in the region of a few percentage points
were described as landslide wins or losses. In the 1990s, this changed
radically. Within ten years, the SVP grew from ten-percent party to the
strongest party in country. The principle of division of power which is
inherent in the Swiss political system prevents the SVP from becoming a
dominant force, but the party’s success have strengthened the
liberal/bourgeois camp and will leave permanent trace in the party system.
The two traditional parties, CVP and FDP, have come under particular
pressure. In 2003 they scored their worst result in the election to the
national parliament since 1919, and their voters shares have been
decreasing for more than 20 years. This suggests that their problem are
independent of economic factors and cannot be resolved with small
programmatic corrections or a more efficient party organization and better
publicity. For the FDP, the question arises as to whether they are about to
share the fate of liberal parties in other countries and be demoted from a
dominant, established party to a potential coalition partner. As concerns the
CVP, it is possible that the brackets formed by the catholic denomination
are about to be broken up permanently. Conservatives forces are just as to
home in the SVP as they are in the CVP, and the Christian socialist could
find a new home on the Left or as an ethical niche party.

8Gerhard Robbers (2007) Encyclopedia of World Constitution, Facts on File Incorporation

Publication, New York, p. 876

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 Bibliography

Books:

 Jacobs, Francis (1989), Switzerland, in: Francis Jacobs (ed.) Western

European Parties, A Comprehensive Guide, Essex: Longman,
 Ladner, Andreas (2007) Handbook of Swiss Politics, 2ns edition.
Zurich
 Robbers, Gerhard (2007) Encyclopedia of World Constitution, New
York: Facts on File Publication

Articles:

 Satori, Giovanni (1976). Parties and Party System: A Framework for

Analysis. Vol. 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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