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I'd wager that there's another reason why big projects are usually pretty successful in Switzerland; time - and budget wise: Political legitimacy, signed off b

I'd wager that there's another reason why big projects are usually pretty successful in Switzerland; time - and budget wise: Political legitimacy, signed off by popular referendum. When you look north to our German neighbors, with a comparable work ethos and certainly a fair understanding of engineering you see projects go south again and again. Be it Stuttgart 21 (the new train station), or that horrible mess that is the airport Berlin Brandenburg. Such projects usually require popular support via referendum in Switzerland. That means that if it is voted through this implies that the necessary capital investments are spoken for and that the project is legitimized via public support. This also means that if the government changes they can't just massage budget positions and siphon funds of such projects for political expedience, or other reasons. Legitimacy also avoids public resistance against the projects as it happened in Stuttgart and which almost killed the project (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuttgart_21#Debate_and_opposition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuttgart_21#Debate_and_opposi...). That's not to say that all big projects in Switzerland work like a charm. But political legimacy and honest budgeting that comes with it seem major factors that such projects are succesful more often than not.

Annatar 10y ago
> I'd wager that there's another reason why big projects are usually pretty successful in Switzerland; time - and budget wise: > Political legitimacy, signed off by popular referendum. Yes, that helps them, a lot. However, that is effect. The root cause of political legitimacy is deeply ingrained in their culture, and it is compromise and consensus seeking, even when divided on an issue. That was a very humbling and instructive experience.
SilasX 10y ago
They both still do rail a lot cheaper, faster, and better than the US :-/
soperj 10y ago
It's interesting because I feel like 20 years ago that Germany was in the same vein as the swiss, things were completed on time and on budget, always. I don't know what's changed.
- capote 10y ago
  I wonder as well. I haven't been on an on-time train in Germany in the past year and a half.
beefman 10y ago
Having a GDP/capita nearly double that of Germany probably helps too.
bogomipz 10y ago
Really there's a referendum on all big projects? Is this governed by a certain threshold i.e above amount X it gets put to referendum? That's pretty awesome if so. In the US this done in a back room away from public view it has various names - pork barrel politics, horse trading, etc. And such allocations are often tacked onto other legislation that might have nothing to do with the project.
- switch007 10y ago
  Switzerland has an interesting political system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland "Switzerland's voting system is unique among modern democratic nations in that Switzerland practices direct democracy in parallel with representative democracy. That's why the Swiss system is called semi-direct democracy.[1] Direct democracy allows any citizen to challenge any law approved by the parliament or, at any time, propose a modification of the federal Constitution. ... Approximately four times a year, voting occurs over various issues; these include both initiatives and referendums, where policies are directly voted on by people, and elections, where the populace votes for officials. "
- 1wd 10y ago
  There are different forms. On a cantonal level there is (among others) a "finance referendum". This may be mandatory or optional depending on the canton. Optional means the project is only actually put to a referendum if an eligible group demands it. An eligible group may be a political party, a certain number of voters, certain interest groups, etc. For example in the Canton of Zürich there is an optional referendum on decisions of the Cantonal Council on new non-recurrent expenditure of more than 6 million francs or new recurrent annual expenditures of more than 600'000 francs. To actually put such a decision to a referendum requires either 3000 voters (public referendum), 12 municipalities, the city of Zürich or the city of Winterthur (municipal referendum), or 45 Cantonal Council members (cantonal referendum). On a federal level there is no "finance referendum". It has been proposed, but most political parties are against it since it could hinder the Federal Council in its freedom of action and delay or even block important investments. But there's a mandatory referendum for all constitutional changes and certain other things like joining supranational communities etc. and a optional referendum for all federal laws and certain other things like international treaties etc. The optional referendum requires 50'000 voters (or eight cantons, but this only actually happened once).
m_mueller 10y ago
> if the government changes So here's the thing to understand about Swiss government: It never changes. Well at least its executive branch doesn't. Bear with me for a moment. Swiss government (federal, cantonal and communal) differs from the American model in three ways: * Power is not concentrated in a single person, but a council (e.g. 7 members on federal level). Decisions (as far as they can go before involving parliament) are made by secret votes inside the council and carried through as a single entity. Council members are supposed to never publicly talk about their individual opinions, only what the council represents as a whole. They're not supposed to be politicians anymore, they're acting much more like a board of directors. * There's no such thing as a government / opposition split in Switzerland. In theory it could happen, but it never plays out this way. Instead, the four largest parties present their council candidates to the national assembly, who then vote for them one after the other. If a candidate doesn't please them the opposing parties form coalitions to vote in a counter candidate from the same party. That's the most spectacle we get. So even a socialist will vote for conservative council members - because the conservative party will do the same in return. It's a political truce that works like this since 67 years [1]. * Council members, while not immune to being 'deelected', in practise tend to stay in office for as long as they want. While there is an election cycle it doesn't really matter the way it plays out. All of this together creates tremendous stability in the Swiss political system. The main instability comes from people's initiatives, which I tend to see as a good thing, since that at least reflects the viewpoint of the majority. Really, sometimes I wonder how they came up with such a well oiled system in 1848. Maybe it helped being able to learn from the first gen. modern Republics and their mistakes (USA and France). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_formula https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_formula

Annatar 10y ago

> I'd wager that there's another reason why big projects are usually pretty successful in Switzerland; time - and budget wise: > Political legitimacy, signed off by popular referendum. Yes, that helps them, a lot. However, that is effect. The root cause of political legitimacy is deeply ingrained in their culture, and it is compromise and consensus seeking, even when divided on an issue. That was a very humbling and instructive experience.

SilasX 10y ago

They both still do rail a lot cheaper, faster, and better than the US :-/

soperj 10y ago

It's interesting because I feel like 20 years ago that Germany was in the same vein as the swiss, things were completed on time and on budget, always. I don't know what's changed.

capote 10y ago
I wonder as well. I haven't been on an on-time train in Germany in the past year and a half.

beefman 10y ago

Having a GDP/capita nearly double that of Germany probably helps too.

bogomipz 10y ago

Really there's a referendum on all big projects? Is this governed by a certain threshold i.e above amount X it gets put to referendum? That's pretty awesome if so. In the US this done in a back room away from public view it has various names - pork barrel politics, horse trading, etc. And such allocations are often tacked onto other legislation that might have nothing to do with the project.

switch007 10y ago
Switzerland has an interesting political system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland "Switzerland's voting system is unique among modern democratic nations in that Switzerland practices direct democracy in parallel with representative democracy. That's why the Swiss system is called semi-direct democracy.[1] Direct democracy allows any citizen to challenge any law approved by the parliament or, at any time, propose a modification of the federal Constitution. ... Approximately four times a year, voting occurs over various issues; these include both initiatives and referendums, where policies are directly voted on by people, and elections, where the populace votes for officials. "
1wd 10y ago
There are different forms. On a cantonal level there is (among others) a "finance referendum". This may be mandatory or optional depending on the canton. Optional means the project is only actually put to a referendum if an eligible group demands it. An eligible group may be a political party, a certain number of voters, certain interest groups, etc. For example in the Canton of Zürich there is an optional referendum on decisions of the Cantonal Council on new non-recurrent expenditure of more than 6 million francs or new recurrent annual expenditures of more than 600'000 francs. To actually put such a decision to a referendum requires either 3000 voters (public referendum), 12 municipalities, the city of Zürich or the city of Winterthur (municipal referendum), or 45 Cantonal Council members (cantonal referendum). On a federal level there is no "finance referendum". It has been proposed, but most political parties are against it since it could hinder the Federal Council in its freedom of action and delay or even block important investments. But there's a mandatory referendum for all constitutional changes and certain other things like joining supranational communities etc. and a optional referendum for all federal laws and certain other things like international treaties etc. The optional referendum requires 50'000 voters (or eight cantons, but this only actually happened once).

m_mueller 10y ago

> if the government changes So here's the thing to understand about Swiss government: It never changes. Well at least its executive branch doesn't. Bear with me for a moment. Swiss government (federal, cantonal and communal) differs from the American model in three ways: * Power is not concentrated in a single person, but a council (e.g. 7 members on federal level). Decisions (as far as they can go before involving parliament) are made by secret votes inside the council and carried through as a single entity. Council members are supposed to never publicly talk about their individual opinions, only what the council represents as a whole. They're not supposed to be politicians anymore, they're acting much more like a board of directors. * There's no such thing as a government / opposition split in Switzerland. In theory it could happen, but it never plays out this way. Instead, the four largest parties present their council candidates to the national assembly, who then vote for them one after the other. If a candidate doesn't please them the opposing parties form coalitions to vote in a counter candidate from the same party. That's the most spectacle we get. So even a socialist will vote for conservative council members - because the conservative party will do the same in return. It's a political truce that works like this since 67 years [1]. * Council members, while not immune to being 'deelected', in practise tend to stay in office for as long as they want. While there is an election cycle it doesn't really matter the way it plays out. All of this together creates tremendous stability in the Swiss political system. The main instability comes from people's initiatives, which I tend to see as a good thing, since that at least reflects the viewpoint of the majority. Really, sometimes I wonder how they came up with such a well oiled system in 1848. Maybe it helped being able to learn from the first gen. modern Republics and their mistakes (USA and France). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_formula https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_formula