The political system of Switzerland: ”Built and driven by the society and the sub-national societies” 7 hypothesis as a contribution to the Training program for Diplomats from Iraq By Andreas Gross (Switzerland) (Political Scientist, MP, Leader of the Socialdemocrats in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in Strasburg) SFDFA/ Multidimensional Diplomacy Bern, November 2 nd 2009

1. The Swiss Federal State is pretty young (*1848) - but grounded on a common existence of 550 years The old Confederation ( ) was very loose and very diverse in many ways: Only few were very weak democracies and many much more oligarchic and aristocratic !

2. Democracy and freedom were results from the French Revolution and the Napoleonian invasion. From 1798 until 1848 a sclerotic oligarchic association of old states became the only democratic State in Europe. New competing elites could only achieve this with the support of the citizens and after a short, “civil civil war”in a European window of opportunity.

3. The Swiss Federal and democratic state was 1848 only possible, because other people in Europe tried also to free themselves from feudal powers. The 1848 “Peoples Spring” were economically and politically - “we want to be our own masters of our life” - reasonable.

4. The way it was achieved and it’s societal diversity marked the political design of the new Swiss Federation Strong Decentralization and Sharing of Powers: Bicameral Parliament as the U.S.A. Collegial Federal Government (No strong President) Double majorities for Constitutional Powers

5. Power sharing - vertical and horizontal - helps you to integrate a diverse society and produces stability by high legitimacy. From the new liberal elites happen to be very elitist; so the peoples starting in the Cantons and ending on Federal level asked for real participatory rights and transformed a primarily representative, indirect democracy in a direct democracy. They enforced an even better power sharing !

6. In Switzerland nobody has so much power that he has the ambivalent privilege, not to have to learn. When the democratic power is really shared with the people, political progress and social change have to be understood as collective learning processes. Every citizen has the right to propose where he or she thing progress and change are necessary !

7. The difficulties of the Swiss system today has two main components: As a consequence of the unique way how it survived the three big wars from and it’s self centric world view during the Cold War Switzerland faces difficulties in it’s relations to Europe and the World. Inside the infrastructure of it’s democracy has to be modernised in order to remake it’s direct democracy serve the people best.