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Switzerland has an awesome electoral system [1]. Instead of being ruled by a president or a prime minister who can be polarising, divisive, or selective, Switz

Switzerland has an awesome electoral system [1]. Instead of being ruled by a president or a prime minister who can be polarising, divisive, or selective, Switzerland has an Executive Council. The 7 member Executive Council is composed of the top 7 candidates from each election. The chairperson of the executive council rotates each year, so that the top 4 vote winners each get a turn at being chairperson. This means that different social and political priorities get implemented in turn. It also means the way the government works is more cooperative, because each council member, including the chairperson, knows there will be a new chairperson next year. So, if a pro-business candidate places 1st, and an environment candidate 2nd, and a social welfare candidate 3rd, and a libertarian candidate 4th, it is in all their interests to cooperate and create legislation that serves all of their interests as much as possible. Instead of disregarding the environment, the pro-business council member is encouraged to develop green business initiatives that will be supported for the full 4 year term under the different chairs. The system creates a leadership team that looks for win-win, rather than a sole victor who can abuse majority rule. [1]. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Council_(Switzerland) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Council_(Switzerland)

marcod 6y ago
Well, that same system also voted on banning Muslim face coverings ("Experts estimate that at most a few dozen Muslim women wear full-face coverings in the country of 8.5 million people."), while a pandemic is going on and face coverings for protection are recommended. https://apnews.com/article/health-legislation-coronavirus-pandemic-carnivals-switzerland-131b4130766ad37fa5faa27d096c8b09 https://apnews.com/article/health-legislation-coronavirus-pa...
- wombatmobile 6y ago
  You seem to be expressing an opinion about banning Muslim face coverings. I am not responding to your expression of opinion - just clarifying how the Swiss electoral system is structured. That vote was a referendum, which is another component of the Swiss system, separate and complimentary to the Executive Council. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland
  - marcod 6y ago
    My bad, I thought the anti electronic ID vote was also a referendum. Populist ideas, can easily thrive in a direct democracy.
    - cies 6y ago
      It was. And the face covering ban was spinned to be against the customs of a minority. It is still allowed indoors. Every country has some clothing requirements. Some mandate headscarfs (for women only), some mandate the face remains visible. No laws were needed for this in Swiss because no people were covering up. But now this has changed, so laws come. I dont find any problem with it, and hope that the "custom" of genital mutilation done to children is next to be forbidden. You can still do it, at 18, but yr parents should not be able to decide for you. Not against jews/muslims, just in favor of childrens rights. Scandinavia is front running on this one.
      - marcod 6y ago
        "But now this has changed, so laws come." A few dozen women in a country of 8.5 million do not need a law, especially one that doesn't really do anything for the victims, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26380029 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26380029
        marcod 6y ago
        Also, look at that image https://storage.googleapis.com/afs-prod/media/1aad669348cc4c74aef0e41c1ffca821/1000.jpeg https://storage.googleapis.com/afs-prod/media/1aad669348cc4c...
- ulucs 6y ago
  Burqua isn't islamic to begin with anyway.
  - stjohnswarts 6y ago
    Yep it's definitely a cultural thing. I think it really is mostly to suppress women and not as a way one shows their religion which one does by living and not by clothing.
    - DoreenMichele 6y ago
      Historically, the veil was considered a huge step forward for women's rights/freedoms as it allowed them to leave the house more than three times in their life. Before that, they left the house to marry and move from their father's home to their husband's and when they died....and maybe I am misremembering that number of "three times" or maybe I just can't remember the third instance. (I'm a woman. I've had a college class in Women's History. FWIW.)
      - ulucs 6y ago
        Point is, islam was a progressive religion. But many countries took it in as a regressive one since they were also taking in customs from the culture which islam was supposed to progress. Which totally misses the point. You shouldn't have been importing burqua if women were already were allowed to go outside without it.
        DoreenMichele 6y ago
        The reality is that progress tends to be a case of two steps forward and one step back. It's also reality that this is true in part because people come up with these theoretical ideals of equality or something and they sometimes don't work in practical reality. Additionally, one way to spread religion is to be tolerant of the existing culture of the people you are hoping to spread the religion to. This is Christianity is associated with a lot of holidays that have seemingly inane and random traditions, such as Easter and Easter Bunnies and hiding Easter eggs. What on earth do bunnies and hiding eggs have to do with each other, much less the risen Christ? Not much, but it's some pagan set of traditions that got tolerated by the Christian church and that's how you have bunnies and hidden eggs all wrapped up with the risen Christ. https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/history-of-easter https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/history-of-easter
- bitcharmer 6y ago
  What's wrong with banning a backwards custom that limits women's rights?
  - XorNot 6y ago
    Because the presumption is that the women in question are being forced to do this and don't want to. But your solution is to implement a law which punishes the victim, rather then doing anything about their presumed victimizer. If the women who didn't want to wear the covering didn't want to wear it, what is stopping them from simply not doing it to start with? The answer of course is husband's, brothers, family etc. and probably that they'd be recognized in their community. But this is someone's religion - a fair bit more important to them then the laws of the state in a lot of cases. So you haven't answered how you're going to protect those women from being targeted and forced to simply never leave the house, if they are being targeted by people who are forcing them to do something they don't want to. Your law offers no solution to this - and again - implements itself by targeting the apparent victims it proposes to protect with punishment. Setting aside that the government can stay the hell out of what I choose to wear, this is just a monumentally stupid approach to anything.
    - stjohnswarts 6y ago
      The laws of religion should not override those of the state. To do so would lead to a theocracy and that has been shown to be almost universally bad on any large scale.
      - Dylan16807 6y ago
        The laws of the state shouldn't go out of their way to get in the way of the laws of religion, doing so for no real reason other than spite. To do so creates conflict where there should be none, which is against the very purpose of a state.
    - supergirl 6y ago
      I imagine the women are not physically forced (or maybe only some are) but instead are “educated” from childhood that this is the way. How would you solve it then?
- jeofken 6y ago
  Is it not more of an expression of how the general public of (native) Europeans want to keep their country for their people and culture
momothereal 6y ago
What happens when a council member leaves office unexpectedly, i.e. dies or resigns? Does it kick an election for everyone or just that one seat?
- wombatmobile 6y ago
  Good question. I'm not sure exactly how the successor is chosen, but this section from Wikipedia indicates just the one member is replaced: > Until 1999, the Constitution mandated that no canton could have more than one representative on the Federal Council. Until 1987, the place of origin was used to determine which canton a Federal Councilor was from. After 1987, the place of residence (or, for councilors who were previously members of the Federal Assembly or of a Canton's legislative or executive body, the canton from which they were elected) became the determinant factor. Nothing prevented candidates from moving to politically expedient cantons, though, and the rule was abandoned in 1999. Since then, the Constitution has mandated an equitable distribution of seats among the cantons and language regions of the country, without setting concrete quotas. Whenever a member resigns, he/she is generally replaced by someone who is not only from the same party, but also the same language region. In 2006, however, Joseph Deiss, a French Swiss, resigned and was succeeded by Doris Leuthard, a German-speaking Swiss, and in 2016, Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, German-speaking, was succeeded by Guy Parmelin, a French Swiss.
- dashdot 6y ago
  The members of the council are elected by the united parliament. They will also elect the successor... Since it's not done by popular vote, political games in that process are rare or just not excessive. The people trust the parliament with the process of electing their leaders, you better shouldn't fail them. So they mostly elect according to the current concordance.
zorked 6y ago
It has its advantages and disadvantages. It is also the political system that caused this: "In 1991 following a decision by the Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland, Appenzell Innerrhoden (AI) became the last Swiss canton to grant women the vote on local issues." Notice how it was a court decision, not a result of the political process. I'd say 1991 is a bit too late to have full voting rights for women. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_suffrage_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_suffrage_in_Switzerl...
- jeofken 6y ago
  How can you so sure that your ideal is how they should live? What I admire about the Swiss is how they live and let live - they may disagree with the neighbour, but let them be.
  - zorked 6y ago
    Why am I not surprised that HN is a place to find people who argue against women's right to vote.
    - jeofken 6y ago
      HN is very diverse :) But we all argue in good faith and are willing to yield to reason
      - mda 6y ago
        "argue in good faith"? "willing to yield to reason"? Please.
        jeofken 6y ago
        Please don’t taint HN with this type of response. HN is such a rare place on the internet, and let’s keep it excellent. The idea you’re dismissing is that of allowing small groups of people rule themselves which does mean some will use unconventional ways they consider best. Note that the Apenzellers didn’t hinder anyone who disagreed to leave or refuse to trade with them. They also didn’t force their way onto others. Switzerland was once just a bunch of small independent nations in a military alliance, which allowed them decentralisation and having multiple competing systems, without everyone having to do it one way. If you have that, you must agree that your neighbour may live in a way you disagree with - but in exchange they will let you live in a way they disagree with, as I’m sure many from Apenzell think of the Züricher. I imagine the Apenzellers argued that the job of the state is military protection. Conscription means the state forces you to give your life for it, and voting rights for conscripts means soldiers will only go to wars they collectively agree with, effectively ruling out wars of aggression. That’s how it was in my country, but I’m not familiar enough with Apenzell (except for their cheese) to talk about their history in this depth.
IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
i disagree wholeheartedly in that it is more cooperative. Switzerland is anything but cooperative. But that's what makes this country so great. We take our divisions, within cantons, and leverage them for positive externalities to (accidentally) benefit the greater good. In CH, every very canton sets their own citizenship policy. Its not a coincidence. Did you hear about the woman that's been living in Zug, and been denied citizenship for years? Why? Because she's annoying. She doesn't respect her neighbor's customs. That's literally why. Yes! Our canton can't even agree between about who can be a citizen, and who may not! But we argue far more... and it won't make the papers. We argue about the standard size of doors, whether we can vote electronically, whether a free trade agreement with andorra should be allowed. Etc etc This means, big project ambitions get cut down to size, and few grand things if any, get done at the federal level. But this is glorious: it is very hard for regulations to become calcified within the state apparatus. So, while spain sends soldiers to die in Afghanistan, or the UK wastes decades of development on a grand EU project, or US citizens get spied on by their own govt via Patriot Act.... CH is just sitting pretty, doing its thing. Arguing about every little detail to exhaustion. The best thing that could happen to us, is to remain just as we are. I welcome the next 800 years of peace and economic development.
- xiphias2 6y ago
  One important thing that was not argued well in my opinion is that the Swiss National Bank pegged its Swiss franc to the euro on Sept. 6, 2011. I lost a lot of money on that day, because I had all my net worth in CHF, as I trusted it to keep its value and not be devalued fast. The good thing that came out from it is that I realized that even Switzerland's central bank cannot be trusted, and moved to Bitcoin. I never looked back.
  - IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
    The tiny swiss were the last to delink its currency to gold. They tried really hard, under enormous pressure, but finally relented in 2000 with the new constitution, where the delink was tied to a bunch of other constitutional directives.. So in summary - The country can only do so much before the big guns aimed at it take their pound of flesh. I am not sure the central bank is faultless in the example you cite, however, appreciate that we live in a world where other powerful people are not interested in the well being of swiss banking customers.
paedubucher 6y ago
> The 7 member Executive Council is composed of the top 7 candidates from each election. The executive council is elected by the parliament and also contains candidates that haven't been member of that parliament. This election takes part "seat by seat", so every member has to be explicitly re-elected.

marcod 6y ago

Well, that same system also voted on banning Muslim face coverings ("Experts estimate that at most a few dozen Muslim women wear full-face coverings in the country of 8.5 million people."), while a pandemic is going on and face coverings for protection are recommended. https://apnews.com/article/health-legislation-coronavirus-pandemic-carnivals-switzerland-131b4130766ad37fa5faa27d096c8b09 https://apnews.com/article/health-legislation-coronavirus-pa...

wombatmobile 6y ago
You seem to be expressing an opinion about banning Muslim face coverings. I am not responding to your expression of opinion - just clarifying how the Swiss electoral system is structured. That vote was a referendum, which is another component of the Swiss system, separate and complimentary to the Executive Council. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_in_Switzerland
- marcod 6y ago
  My bad, I thought the anti electronic ID vote was also a referendum. Populist ideas, can easily thrive in a direct democracy.
  - cies 6y ago
    It was. And the face covering ban was spinned to be against the customs of a minority. It is still allowed indoors. Every country has some clothing requirements. Some mandate headscarfs (for women only), some mandate the face remains visible. No laws were needed for this in Swiss because no people were covering up. But now this has changed, so laws come. I dont find any problem with it, and hope that the "custom" of genital mutilation done to children is next to be forbidden. You can still do it, at 18, but yr parents should not be able to decide for you. Not against jews/muslims, just in favor of childrens rights. Scandinavia is front running on this one.
    - marcod 6y ago
      "But now this has changed, so laws come." A few dozen women in a country of 8.5 million do not need a law, especially one that doesn't really do anything for the victims, see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26380029 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26380029
      - marcod 6y ago
        Also, look at that image https://storage.googleapis.com/afs-prod/media/1aad669348cc4c74aef0e41c1ffca821/1000.jpeg https://storage.googleapis.com/afs-prod/media/1aad669348cc4c...
ulucs 6y ago
Burqua isn't islamic to begin with anyway.
- stjohnswarts 6y ago
  Yep it's definitely a cultural thing. I think it really is mostly to suppress women and not as a way one shows their religion which one does by living and not by clothing.
  - DoreenMichele 6y ago
    Historically, the veil was considered a huge step forward for women's rights/freedoms as it allowed them to leave the house more than three times in their life. Before that, they left the house to marry and move from their father's home to their husband's and when they died....and maybe I am misremembering that number of "three times" or maybe I just can't remember the third instance. (I'm a woman. I've had a college class in Women's History. FWIW.)
    - ulucs 6y ago
      Point is, islam was a progressive religion. But many countries took it in as a regressive one since they were also taking in customs from the culture which islam was supposed to progress. Which totally misses the point. You shouldn't have been importing burqua if women were already were allowed to go outside without it.
      - DoreenMichele 6y ago
        The reality is that progress tends to be a case of two steps forward and one step back. It's also reality that this is true in part because people come up with these theoretical ideals of equality or something and they sometimes don't work in practical reality. Additionally, one way to spread religion is to be tolerant of the existing culture of the people you are hoping to spread the religion to. This is Christianity is associated with a lot of holidays that have seemingly inane and random traditions, such as Easter and Easter Bunnies and hiding Easter eggs. What on earth do bunnies and hiding eggs have to do with each other, much less the risen Christ? Not much, but it's some pagan set of traditions that got tolerated by the Christian church and that's how you have bunnies and hidden eggs all wrapped up with the risen Christ. https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/history-of-easter https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/history-of-easter
bitcharmer 6y ago
What's wrong with banning a backwards custom that limits women's rights?
- XorNot 6y ago
  Because the presumption is that the women in question are being forced to do this and don't want to. But your solution is to implement a law which punishes the victim, rather then doing anything about their presumed victimizer. If the women who didn't want to wear the covering didn't want to wear it, what is stopping them from simply not doing it to start with? The answer of course is husband's, brothers, family etc. and probably that they'd be recognized in their community. But this is someone's religion - a fair bit more important to them then the laws of the state in a lot of cases. So you haven't answered how you're going to protect those women from being targeted and forced to simply never leave the house, if they are being targeted by people who are forcing them to do something they don't want to. Your law offers no solution to this - and again - implements itself by targeting the apparent victims it proposes to protect with punishment. Setting aside that the government can stay the hell out of what I choose to wear, this is just a monumentally stupid approach to anything.
  - stjohnswarts 6y ago
    The laws of religion should not override those of the state. To do so would lead to a theocracy and that has been shown to be almost universally bad on any large scale.
    - Dylan16807 6y ago
      The laws of the state shouldn't go out of their way to get in the way of the laws of religion, doing so for no real reason other than spite. To do so creates conflict where there should be none, which is against the very purpose of a state.
  - supergirl 6y ago
    I imagine the women are not physically forced (or maybe only some are) but instead are “educated” from childhood that this is the way. How would you solve it then?
jeofken 6y ago
Is it not more of an expression of how the general public of (native) Europeans want to keep their country for their people and culture

momothereal 6y ago

What happens when a council member leaves office unexpectedly, i.e. dies or resigns? Does it kick an election for everyone or just that one seat?

wombatmobile 6y ago
Good question. I'm not sure exactly how the successor is chosen, but this section from Wikipedia indicates just the one member is replaced: > Until 1999, the Constitution mandated that no canton could have more than one representative on the Federal Council. Until 1987, the place of origin was used to determine which canton a Federal Councilor was from. After 1987, the place of residence (or, for councilors who were previously members of the Federal Assembly or of a Canton's legislative or executive body, the canton from which they were elected) became the determinant factor. Nothing prevented candidates from moving to politically expedient cantons, though, and the rule was abandoned in 1999. Since then, the Constitution has mandated an equitable distribution of seats among the cantons and language regions of the country, without setting concrete quotas. Whenever a member resigns, he/she is generally replaced by someone who is not only from the same party, but also the same language region. In 2006, however, Joseph Deiss, a French Swiss, resigned and was succeeded by Doris Leuthard, a German-speaking Swiss, and in 2016, Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, German-speaking, was succeeded by Guy Parmelin, a French Swiss.
dashdot 6y ago
The members of the council are elected by the united parliament. They will also elect the successor... Since it's not done by popular vote, political games in that process are rare or just not excessive. The people trust the parliament with the process of electing their leaders, you better shouldn't fail them. So they mostly elect according to the current concordance.

zorked 6y ago

It has its advantages and disadvantages. It is also the political system that caused this: "In 1991 following a decision by the Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland, Appenzell Innerrhoden (AI) became the last Swiss canton to grant women the vote on local issues." Notice how it was a court decision, not a result of the political process. I'd say 1991 is a bit too late to have full voting rights for women. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_suffrage_in_Switzerland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_suffrage_in_Switzerl...

jeofken 6y ago
How can you so sure that your ideal is how they should live? What I admire about the Swiss is how they live and let live - they may disagree with the neighbour, but let them be.
- zorked 6y ago
  Why am I not surprised that HN is a place to find people who argue against women's right to vote.
  - jeofken 6y ago
    HN is very diverse :) But we all argue in good faith and are willing to yield to reason
    - mda 6y ago
      "argue in good faith"? "willing to yield to reason"? Please.
      - jeofken 6y ago
        Please don’t taint HN with this type of response. HN is such a rare place on the internet, and let’s keep it excellent. The idea you’re dismissing is that of allowing small groups of people rule themselves which does mean some will use unconventional ways they consider best. Note that the Apenzellers didn’t hinder anyone who disagreed to leave or refuse to trade with them. They also didn’t force their way onto others. Switzerland was once just a bunch of small independent nations in a military alliance, which allowed them decentralisation and having multiple competing systems, without everyone having to do it one way. If you have that, you must agree that your neighbour may live in a way you disagree with - but in exchange they will let you live in a way they disagree with, as I’m sure many from Apenzell think of the Züricher. I imagine the Apenzellers argued that the job of the state is military protection. Conscription means the state forces you to give your life for it, and voting rights for conscripts means soldiers will only go to wars they collectively agree with, effectively ruling out wars of aggression. That’s how it was in my country, but I’m not familiar enough with Apenzell (except for their cheese) to talk about their history in this depth.

IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago

i disagree wholeheartedly in that it is more cooperative. Switzerland is anything but cooperative. But that's what makes this country so great. We take our divisions, within cantons, and leverage them for positive externalities to (accidentally) benefit the greater good. In CH, every very canton sets their own citizenship policy. Its not a coincidence. Did you hear about the woman that's been living in Zug, and been denied citizenship for years? Why? Because she's annoying. She doesn't respect her neighbor's customs. That's literally why. Yes! Our canton can't even agree between about who can be a citizen, and who may not! But we argue far more... and it won't make the papers. We argue about the standard size of doors, whether we can vote electronically, whether a free trade agreement with andorra should be allowed. Etc etc This means, big project ambitions get cut down to size, and few grand things if any, get done at the federal level. But this is glorious: it is very hard for regulations to become calcified within the state apparatus. So, while spain sends soldiers to die in Afghanistan, or the UK wastes decades of development on a grand EU project, or US citizens get spied on by their own govt via Patriot Act.... CH is just sitting pretty, doing its thing. Arguing about every little detail to exhaustion. The best thing that could happen to us, is to remain just as we are. I welcome the next 800 years of peace and economic development.

xiphias2 6y ago
One important thing that was not argued well in my opinion is that the Swiss National Bank pegged its Swiss franc to the euro on Sept. 6, 2011. I lost a lot of money on that day, because I had all my net worth in CHF, as I trusted it to keep its value and not be devalued fast. The good thing that came out from it is that I realized that even Switzerland's central bank cannot be trusted, and moved to Bitcoin. I never looked back.
- IG_Semmelweiss 6y ago
  The tiny swiss were the last to delink its currency to gold. They tried really hard, under enormous pressure, but finally relented in 2000 with the new constitution, where the delink was tied to a bunch of other constitutional directives.. So in summary - The country can only do so much before the big guns aimed at it take their pound of flesh. I am not sure the central bank is faultless in the example you cite, however, appreciate that we live in a world where other powerful people are not interested in the well being of swiss banking customers.

paedubucher 6y ago

> The 7 member Executive Council is composed of the top 7 candidates from each election. The executive council is elected by the parliament and also contains candidates that haven't been member of that parliament. This election takes part "seat by seat", so every member has to be explicitly re-elected.