Political sea change? In the wake of the recent Federal Council elections, Swiss politics has sailed into more conservative waters. The traditional so-called magic formula has been cast overboard and a new political concoction may be on the horizon.
| Auteur | Anderson, Robert (American businessman and engineer) |
| Fonction | Politics |
Politics as usual, for once, was not the analogy, used to describe the Swiss Federal Council elections held on December 10, 2003. On the contrary, the outcome has further fueled the debate over which course the government is plotting and, in the process, actually sparked more outside interest in the nation's otherwise propitious, prophesied political affairs. The swirling speculation in the run-up to the elections in Berne has now turned into stark reality: there's a new man in town, his name is Christoph Blocher, and he is changing the face of Swiss politics--some say for better, some say for worse, but definitely conservative.
The Outcome was Decisive
For more than forty years, Switzerland's four largest political parties--namely, FDP, SP, CVP and SVP--have shared power on the country's governing seven-member Federal Council according to the "magic formula"--a procedure that calls for allocating two seats each to the FDP, SP and CVP, with merely one for the right-wing conservative party, the SVP. After trouncing the other parties in the past two parliamentary elections, the SVP has succeeded in breaking this longstanding tradition, gaining a coveted second seat and a stronger voice on the ruling body, thereby steering the country's political machinery in a new direction. The SVP and conservative poster boy Christoph Blocher definitely emerged the winners; the CVP and Ruth Metzler turned out to be the losers, in this latest political power struggle, which saw the reshuffling of the executive council in an unprecedented swing toward the right.
The View From Abroad
The council elections indeed created a stir among Switzerland's neighbors. The commentary from abroad was notably focused on the country's possible shift to a more right-wing, populist agenda. The German media portended that Switzerland would take "a more critical view toward the European Union," while the Financial Times wrote that Swiss politics would not be the same; the country's partners should take notice. In neighboring Austria, the press even deemed the outcome a "revolution" in the making. And the French newspaper Liberation described the SVP as "nationalistic, xenophobic and anti-Europe."
The Numbers
The members of Switzerland's governing seven-seat Federal Council are elected by the entire Federal Assembly in the session following their own election by the people every four years, according to Article 132 of the parliamentary law, and anchored in Article 164 of the...
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