Two important proposals for the citizens of the Swiss Confederation

by Erika Vögeli

On 17 June the voters in Switzerland will vote on two proposals that do not have much in common at first glance: First, on the people’s initiative “To strengthen the people’s rights in foreign policy (International treaties before the people!)” (see page 4f), on the other hand on the amendment of the Federal Law on Health Insurance (“Managed Care”). Nevertheless, here are close links that affect the substance of our democracy, democracy in general.

It is one of the central achievements of the Enlightenment that the shaping of human coexistence, also in the political sphere, must start out from the basic equivalence of all people. One fruit of this knowledge is the democratic constitutional state. The democratically constituted state – the res publica – which is legitimated only through the obligation to the common good based on the dignity of the individual, the citizenship of the human being: the will of the citizens constitutes the state, and the right that they give themselves, determines the rules of their living together.

Thereby Switzerland has gone further than other countries: grown by historical experiences and struggles something has developed in the form of direct democracy, which takes these principles into account more than any other form of state and government. The federal structure, which has in turn contributed to the internal balance and the obvious respect for lingual and cultural minorities, the deliberate non-participation in power politics manifest in the form of our neutrality, humanitarian Switzerland, the concordance democracy and its more sustainable, broad-based solutions – they are all directly and indirectly connected with the direct democracy and have contributed to our country and the people living here – even for all prevailing deficiences and problems – to create the conditions for a life in peace and freedom.

Democracy can only exist on the basis of an honest debate, it requires the presentation of all facts relevant to a decision of importance, the open discussion of the various interest groups, setting out their concerns, their arguments, reasons, doubts, being able to argue out their pros and cons in an open dialogue – in Switzerland we have well-developed mechanisms that contribute much to the fact that decisions are sustainable and better supported than anywhere else. The whining about the fact that such decisions take longer, in view of the result is not right. This should apply all the more to foreign policy – the one who is committed to the common good and knows the value of our democracy, does not need quick-fix decisions, no rough-and-ready approaches and has no problems, to represent the concerns of their own people, whose interests is to protect, before a couple of diplomats.

In addition, many contracts and reforms prove to be products of a strange origin. Following up the question of the origin of the reform tide in recent years in various fields – health, education, military, in the areas of community organization (fusions) and regional policy (metropolitan areas and natural parks), administration and many others – for once from another angle, you will recognize common features not originating in Switzerland, but due to targeted influence from outside. The “Managed Care” programs are not a Swiss invention, they do not go back to solutions that were developed here for problems that have originated here, but are imported by the OECD, even though our health system is still regarded as one of the best. How did we come to import models whose failure we can actually study elsewhere?

It is very enlightening to get to the bottom of the origin of all these reforms – and note that they originate from a fairly unified cup of international organizations (IO) – for example, the EU Commission and the OECD, that have ruined Europe. Meanwhile, people openly speak and write about such IO being mere instruments of “soft power” pursuing their “hidden agenda” by way of bypassing democracy.

“Soft governance” and “soft power” are less obvious than “hard power” though – in the assertion of interests by force and power – they manipulate better because they create less resistance. But they are just as undemocratic, devious and without any justification. They ruin the foundations of cooperation and break the confidence – that can not be retrieved. Both proposals go to the heart of democracy and need the active citizenship with a ‘no’ to ‘Managed Care’ and a ‘yes’ to the further development of the treaty referendum.     •