$Unique_ID{COW03553}
$Pretitle{442}
$Title{Switzerland
4. The Organisation of Living Conditions: Education, the Economy, Politics}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Rene Levy}
$Affiliation{Arts Coucil of Switzerland}
$Subject{switzerland
education
political
social
cantons
important
state
time
century
swiss}
$Date{1986}
$Log{Making Bread*0355301.scf
}
Country:     Switzerland
Book:        The Social Structure of Switzerland Outline of a Society
Author:      Rene Levy
Affiliation: Arts Coucil of Switzerland
Date:        1986

4. The Organisation of Living Conditions: Education, the Economy, Politics

[See Making Bread: Courtesy Embassy of Switzerland, Washington DC.]

a) The Various Sectors of Society

     The description of how the various tangible and intangible assets which
determine the standard of living are distributed has repeatedly demonstrated
the fact that these "goods" are produced and distributed within society. The
institutions from which they come represent that part of the social structure
which has the most direct effect on the living conditions of the individual
members of society. Having dealt with living conditions and related
inequalities we shall now examine in detail in this chapter and the next the
social elements giving rise to these conditions.

     Social assets are produced and distributed to a large extent within
specialised social frameworks, which can be grouped together as sectors
characterised by the sort of "goods" they produce and thus by a certain
uniformity. Out of these sectors we shall examine education, the economy and
politics because they would appear to be especially important from the
following points of view: 1) the importance of what they produce and
distribute with respect to the daily life of the individual, and 2) their
influence on the whole of society. Thus we shall not deal with other sectors,
such as the army or religion, or only mention them in passing, such as mass
media. We shall only consider certain aspects of the three sectors we have
selected, namely those aspects which involve their influence on the situation
of the people who live in Switzerland.

     From this point of view the distribution of social assets is more
important than their production, although both aspects are closely linked. In
this sense distribution signifies a continual (active) process, whereas in the
previous chapter the passive condition which is the result of the active
process was meant. It has already been stated that social assets are mainly
produced within an organised framework, e.g. in schools, hospitals, factories.
This does not apply to the same extent to distribution. Certain social goods
are principally distributed on the open market and are therefore in theory
available to everyone. But in practice access to this market very much depends
on available income and thus on social status. A typical example of a
necessity which is distributed on the open market in Switzerland is
accommodation. Houses and flats are built by commercial organisations but for
the most part sold or rented on the open market. In 1970 only 28% of all
families owned their own home (compared to 37% in 1950); the majority of the
population lives in rented property. Other assets, however, are mainly
available to members of a certain social sector and the higher one has managed
to climb in that sector the more one can take advantage of what is available.
Education is an example of such an asset. Education is only available to a
limited extent on the free market. For the most part it is "obtained" by
belonging to an educational institution for a certain time and following a
certain course according to that institution's rules.

     The way in which assets which are valued in a society are produced and
distributed within it is an important characteristic of its structure and this
factor will affect the continuation or change of that society. Let us now
examine these three sectors - education, the economy and politics - and their
historical development.

b) Education

     A continual education system, available to all sections of society, was
introduced in Switzerland only after the beginning of the 19th century.
Earlier there had been hardly any official regulations and education had been
provided by the church. For a long time the main subject taught was religion,
and such things as reading, writing and arithmetic were only taught at a few
urban institutions which were attended by the sons of the wealthier families.
A consequence of the Enlightenment was the philanthropist education movement,
which reached Switzerland partly via Germany. The ideas propounded by this
movement gradually led to concrete results at the beginning of last century,
when Switzerland, in the wake of the French Revolution, laid the foundation
stone for a standardised school system. The famous educationalist, Pestalozzi,
was one of the members of this movement.

     It was at this time that most cantons introduced general compulsory
schooling. Geneva was the only canton which had taken this step earlier (in
1536, during the Reformation), in fact long before it joined the Swiss
confederation. The education system continued to undergo changes during the
Swiss Restoration (1815-1830). The schools were secularised, i.e. removed from
the influence of the church; teaching became a profession and many private
schools were founded, in turn stimulating the state policy of education. The
Swiss universities were also founded in the 19th century; only the University
of Basle dates from the late Middle Ages (1460). The universities were often
based in fact on Faculties of Theology, especially in the French-speaking part
of Switzerland. After the new constitution came into force in 1848, according
to which education was the responsibility of the cantonal authorities, each
canton introduced its own laws in this respect. Under the revised constitution
of 1874 the cantons had even more sovereignty in matters of schooling. An
important new characteristic which developed at this time of fundamental
change in education policy was the aim of schooling, which was to "educate the
children of all classes of society, according to common principles, to become
spiritually active, socially productive and morally religious people", as the
canton of Zurich's Education Act of 1859 puts it. According to the ideology of
the rising middle classes all children would receive the same education and
their progress thereafter would no longer depend on social status but solely
on individual achievement. Schools were considered to be sources of ethical
education, where moral and political values were emphasised as much as
knowledge and achievement. Furthermore education was to be all-embracing, an
education of the body as well as the mind.

     One of the most noticeable characteristics of the Swiss school system is
the extent to which the cantons are independent in matters of education
policy. Although the responsibility of education has been handed over to the
state, this was at a cantonal and not a national level. The federal
authorities have in fact had a limited degree of influence on standardising
education throughout the country, but only in an indirect way, for example by
introducing a state examination in medicine and national recognition of the
matura (the equivalent of A-levels). The result of all this is that there are
as many different school systems in Switzerland as there are cantons. At each
level a large variety of material is used for the same subjects, there are
enormous differences in the examinations set and the grading systems, and the
academic year does not even begin during the same season in all parts of the
country. There are, however, some trends which are common to education
throughout the country.

     Since the middle of the 19th century much more emphasis has been given to
quantitative and qualitative expansion. Let us just mention two of the many
consequences of this expansion policy: before the turn of the century, the new
conscripts from the poorer cantons produced much worse results in the
recruitment examinations than those from richer cantons where the level of
education available was higher. (The federal authorities introduced these
examinations in order to check whether the cantons were fulfilling their
obligations as regards education). After the turn of the century this
relationship between examination results and the wealth of the canton of
origin was no longer obvious because education during the compulsory period
was to some extent standardised. A second, less obvious effect of education is
the fall in the birthrate, which can be more or less directly linked to the
expansion of the educational system and thus the birth rate fell first in
those cantons which were more progressive.

     Further developments include compulsory schooling being extended from 8
to 9 years, the expansion of vocational and secondary school facilities,
decentralisation in these institutions and expansion in university education
(as already described in Chapter 3). Payment of compensation and graduated
grants are aimed to ensure that students from cantons without their own
university can enjoy the same educational opportunities as students from
cantons having a university. At all levels the number of people to be educated
and the number successfully finishing some sort of education have in reality
increased. There is, however, a strong correlation between the financial
strength of any one canton, the grants it awards and the number of university
students per 100,000 inhabitants. The same correlation can be seen regarding
the proportion of females among children leaving school with the "matura" and
among students.

     Today the Swiss education system has still not fulfilled its original aim
of ensuring the same opportunities for all strata of society. For many decades
the proportion of working-class university students has fluctuated at around
5% and the mainly quantitative programme of expansion described above has had
very little effect in altering the degree of inequality in educational
opportunities for the poorer and the wealthier sectors of society. This
problem is even more acute for children of foreigners working in Switzerland.

     Vocational training is still based very much on the principle of a trade
apprenticeship. This apprenticeship is normally done in a firm and is thus
controlled by the economy and designed to meet the economy's needs to a
greater extent than it would be if it were organised by a school, despite the
fact that an increasing number of higher technical colleges have been founded
in recent years. For a long time the expansion of the education system was
more or less independent of economic change. But since the 1940s state
schools have been brought more into line with the aims of the economy and
influenced by economic change. However, the school system does not seem to
react very rapidly in a quantitative way to such demands: Switzerland still
imports specialised knowledge not only in the form of patents but also in that
she employs foreign specialists whose level of qualification is rising
constantly. For example in 1970 10.3% of technical draughtsmen, 22.9% of
highly qualified employees in technical fields and as many as 30.8% of
technical graduates were foreigners.

     It has already been established that the extension of compulsory
schooling, the expansion of secondary and higher school facilities and the
provision of such facilities in areas previously lacking them have led to an
extension of the "interim period" for young people and to an increase in the
number of young people in this phase. At the same time the level of education
of the younger section of the population is gradually rising and certain
inequalities in education are being ironed out (at least inequality between
boys and girls and between poor and wealthy areas). These developments are not
principally due to a change in individual behaviour, for example increased
demand for education, but rather to decisions governing the modification of
the organisational structures which provide education. Such influences are
partly political such as the composition of school curricula or the fixing of
expenditure on education (the latter rose considerably after the Russians
surprised and impressed western Europe by getting their "sputnik" into orbit
in the late 1950s; expenditure on education is now being reduced). Sometimes,
however, these influences come directly from the economy, for example through
more apprenticeships being offered in expanding branches such as trade and
commerce or the machine industry than in branches which are losing business or
going over to a high degree of automation. The education system is also
influenced to a lesser extent by plebiscites, as for example in 1973, when a
bill concerning the "right to an education", which should have been guaranteed
by the confederation, was rejected in a popular vote.

c) The Economy

1. The Industrial Revolution

     The importance of the economy is not only the fact that it turns out
producer and consumer goods; it also provides a framework for employment and
thus represents the main source of income for the majority of the population.
It is therefore impossible for most people to avoid belonging to this social
sector, and the economy is thus of the utmost importance both for the
individual and for society as a whole. Some of the prerequisites of
industrialisation in Switzerland and of the newer developments in her economy
have already been described above, as have some of the factors which have
brought about changes in working conditions. How did industrialisation come
about in Switzerland and what social impact did it have?

     The relative rapidity with which the Swiss economy moved into the
industrial age in the first 30 years of the 19th century was favoured by the
prior existence of certain conditions, including the fact that Switzerland was
one of the busiest trading countries in Europe in the 18th century. Thus the
industrial revolution in Switzerland consisted to a great extent of
mechanising the existing industries; the social revolution involved came about
more slowly. According to a contemporary estimate, which must be considered
exaggerated, before the end of the 18th century roughly two-thirds of the
rural population in Switzerland were no longer making a living in agriculture
but in crafts and trades and in the earlier forms of industry. In 1800 the
official figure for the proportion of workers engaged in crafts and trades was
a little over 25%. First of all two pre-industrial manufacturing branches
developed quite independently of one another and they were both aimed
principally at the export market. The first was the watch-making industry,
which started in the 17th century in Geneva and then spread to the higher
valleys in the Jura. The second was the textile industry, which was already
well established in eastern Switzerland (in the cantons of Zurich and St.
Gall) and later spread to such places as Fribourg. Apart from cloth - first
wool and linen, and later silk and cotton - the textile factories also started
producing more and more high quality finished articles, such as silk ribbon,
embroidery and printed fabrics. For a long time Swiss products in these two
branches led the international market. It is estimated that in the 18th
century about 90% of the world market for watches and clocks was covered by
Swiss products. In the 15th and 16th centuries St. Gall was the centre of the
European linen trade. While no great changes were introduced in the watch
industry until towards the end of the 19th century, the textile industry was
developing rapidly, mainly because of increased pressure from international
competition. On the one hand the firms started expanding early and
mechanising, which led to reductions in the normal outworker system,
threatened the income of these workers and, as in other countries, resulted in
a public reaction against machines (e.g. the burning of the Uster factory in
1832). On the other hand, three ancillary branches soon developed into
industries in their own right: the machine and electrical industries were well
established by the end of the first decade of the 19th century, and the
chemical industry by the second half of the same century. The machine industry
was especially boosted by the construction of the railways, which in its turn
had been helped among other things by the fact that under the federal
constitution of 1848 cantonal and local tolls were abolished and trade was
thus stimulated. The development of the railways led to expansion in banking
and later insurance, because the previously existing forms of finance were not
sufficient to cope with the new projects.

     The enormous development in industrial production methods also had an
effect on other parts of the economy. Industry employed a growing proportion
of the population. At first this was counterbalanced by a drop only in the
number of people employed in agriculture, because there was a considerable
increase in the population at the same time: between 1800 and 1900 the
population of Switzerland doubled. Another reason for this rapid increase in
population was that before the Treaty of Vienna in 1815 Switzerland had for
many centuries been the most important European source of mercenaries and this
demographic safety valve was closed once and for all under the terms of the
Treaty. As a result of industrialisation the services sector also began to
expand because more and more aspects of trade, transport and also the
administration of funds were not dealt with by the manufacturers or the
entrepreneurs but handed over to specialised firms. The proportion of people
employed in agriculture started to fall at an early stage, although the
decrease was slow at first and accelerated after the mid-1800s.
Industrialisation and the new and clearly successful ideas concerning
business, which were an essential part of it, also stimulated reform within
agriculture. More thought was given to profitability and production started to
be planned in the strictest sense. Important innovations regarding such things
as the three-field system, planted pasture-land, the cultivation of potatoes
and systematic manuring had actually already been introduced in the 18th
century. As a result of the French Revolution and the centralised state of
Switzerland imposed by Napoleon, Swiss farmers too were given equal political
rights and freehold rights to the land they worked, although they often ran
deep into debt owing to the compensation they had to pay.

     An important characteristic of Switzerland is the decentralised
settlement pattern, which affected the fundamental changes of the 19th century
and also contributed to the lack of major conflict between workers and
management. Before the industrial revolution only a small proportion of the
Swiss population lived in towns. However, in 1875 still only approximately 10%
of the population lived in the 12 towns which had more than 10,000
inhabitants. The economy and the social structure of these towns were still
very much influenced by the system of guilds, which had developed over many
centuries. The guild rules limited trading possibilities for the middle
classes to such an extent that new industries were set up mainly in rural
areas, especially in eastern Switzerland, where other advantages were to be
found, in particular cheap labour and abundant local water-power. For a long
time the textile industry in eastern Switzerland employed principally
outworkers, who were at the same time farmers and did not go to work in
factories. The watch industry in the Jura ran on the same principle. Thus when
this type of work was replaced by factory work the decentralised network of
small-holdings remained and many former outworkers went to work in the
factories but at the same time continued to farm on a small, subsistence
scale. In this way their life-style was completely different from that of the
plain factory workers who lived in urban blocks of flats. It was the major
economic crises at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of this
century which led to massive concentration trends, including a greater
concentration of people in the towns.

2. Restructuring

     Concentration and restructuring are the two key-words for the several
waves of change which the Swiss economy has gone through since the beginnings
of industrialisation. Restructuring firstly in that the proportion of people
employed in agriculture fell steadily in comparison with the number of workers
and the total value of the goods produced. In contrast the number of workers
engaged in industry steadily rose to a maximum figure of 49% in 1963-64. Since
then the percentage has been falling slightly, while the percentage of people
employed in service industries has continuously risen. In 1971 it exceeded
those employed in industry and is now over 50%.

     A different kind of restructuring has become apparent recently, and is
probably only just beginning. In industry those branches and departments
concentrating on research and development or highly specialised products which
demand highly qualified work and major investment have been expanding. At the
same time, apart from expansion in certain public services (schools,
hospitals, administration), there has been considerable development in those
sections of the services sector which provide administrative, advisory and
management services for other firms.

3. Concentration

     The concentration of the economy happened in several waves and affected
all sectors, including agriculture. This sector became highly mechanised a
long time ago, thereby saving labour and labour costs. Farmers did become
entrepreneurs, but not employers; the family "business" is still the rule in
farming. Thanks to mechanisation the productivity level of Swiss agriculture
has risen enormously, and despite a considerable overall drop in the number of
people employed in agriculture (in 1800 65% of the working population were
involved in farming, in 1900 30% and in 1980 only 7%) the level of national
self-sufficiency has in fact risen. It varies considerably according to the
product but the overall figure is 65% of the calory value of products
consumed. This development has caused the farmers to get into debt to such a
degree that they are among the highest debtors in the world (per farm and per
acre) and this situation is getting no better. At the same time the means of
production have become concentrated; in 1876 only 2.2% of all cattle-farmers
owned more than 20 head of cattle, whereas in 1973 this figure was 42%.
However, over the same period the number of cattle-farmers fell by one third.
(The same has happened as regards the amount of land cultivated per farm).
Agriculture is the subject of a complicated state protection policy which
includes price guarantees and various types of subsidies. Over the past few
decades the farmers have only been able to survive despite their debts because
they could take advantage of interest-free or low-interest state loans.

     The degree of concentration of the economy and thus also of potential
means of influence available to employers is far greater in other sectors. For
example the ten largest firms in the metal and machine industry employ 29% of
all workers in this branch. With very few exceptions they are all
multinational companies which manufacture a large part of their products
outside Switzerland; 62% (i.e. 177,000 people) of their total number of
employees work outside the country. Nevertheless medium-sized and small firms
are relatively common and are either contracted suppliers to larger firms or
independent suppliers of specialised goods or services; these firms also act
partly as a buffer in times of economic crisis. For an example of
concentration in the services sector let us look at banks. The Swiss banking
system is very diverse in its composition and comprises, 1,644 institutions at
present. It is, however, dominated by two types of institutions, at least
from the point of view of the proportion of the total value of the
balance-sheets; these two lobbies comprise 29 cantonal banks and 5 major
private banks. Both types of institution originate basically from the last
century but have developed in opposite directions. The value of the
balance-sheets of the (publicly owned) cantonal banks, the largest of which
are almost as important as the (privately owned) major banks, has fallen from
39.5% (1945) to 21.7% (1980) of the total value, i.e. by almost half, while
the proportion ascribed to the major banks has doubled, from 25.1% to 51.3%.
The banks have expanded enormously over the past few years, at the same time
gaining much influence in other parts of the economy, either as lenders,
through direct membership of administrative boards or as trustee
representatives for large capital shares.

     The concentration trend is not only resulting in the massing of economic
power in specific branches, but is also having serious consequences in other
areas, such as the press. In 1939 there was a total of 406 different
newspapers in Switzerland, a country which has always been renowned for its
choice of newspapers. In 1979 there were only 293, more than 25% fewer. At the
same time, however, the circulation of the surviving newspapers rose by 58%.
In 1975 the 10 largest newspapers in Switzerland covered 45% of the market.
These changes, mainly due to mergers, have resulted in a major shift in
political alignment in the press. Amongst the smaller newspapers there is a
variety of political tendencies, for although the majority are conservative,
there are also left-wing and independent newspapers to be found. There is a
paucity of left-wing publications among those newspapers with a medium
circulation (20,000 to 50,000), the proportion of independent papers being
strong in this range. Amongst those newspapers with a high circulation the
independent ones play a leading role. Recent experience has shown that this
development is problematic politically in as far as these papers have to be
very considerate of people who use their pages for advertising. For this
reason their leading position might well result in their definite political
stands having increasingly limited chances of being published.

     Another characteristic of the Swiss economy is the large number of
cartels which exist. Through agreements made between the leading firms in any
one branch concerning price maintenance, delivery conditions, division of the
market according to areas and other criteria, these cartels cover the market
in almost every type of product. Switzerland has one of the highest
proportions of cartels and freely set prices, not controlled through any
agreement, are an exception. We shall not discuss here whether this is
advantageous or disadvantageous to the national economy. There is, however, no
doubt that apart from signifying a concentration of trade, it is also another
indication of the widening gap between the manufacturer's power and that of
the consumer.

4. Employer and Employee

     The stormy economic progress of the 19th and to a certain extent the 20th
centuries also had its reverse side from the social point of view. In the 19th
century, especially between 1840 and 1860, there was continual unrest due to
virtual mass poverty. Before this period there had even been a famine
(1816/17), when for example in the canton of St. Gall about 4% of the
population died of hunger. For a long time the characteristics of working life
were child labour (up until 1842 almost half of the people employed in the
cotton industry in Zurich, for example, were children; in the whole of
Switzerland this figure was still 10.5% in 1911), an extremely long working
day, poor working conditions and insufficient protection against accidents and
industrial illnesses. Switzerland was one of the first countries where
official measures were taken and laws passed to protect the worker and improve
his conditions of employment. The first law on the protection of children to
be passed in Europe came into force in the canton of Zurich in 1815; according
to this law the minimum age for employment was 10 and the maximum working
hours per day were 12-14. The first Factory Act was passed in the canton of
Glarus in 1864. However, it must be pointed out that effective measures
against impoverishment, unemployment and health risks were only achieved after
a long period of class conflict which culminated in the General Strike of
1918. In 1877 a doctor estimated the life expectancy of various sections of
the population as follows: for metal workers 35, for the wealthy middle
classes 55 and for clergymen 64.

     The most important economic lobbies had already been formed during the
19th century, after freedom of association had been introduced under the terms
of the federal constitution of 1848. The order in which they were founded is
significant. After the workers' educational organisations came the first
political pressure group in 1870: the Swiss Association of Trade and Industry.
Nine years later, in 1879, the members of the various trades formed the Swiss
Trades Federation and the workers formed the Swiss Federation of Trade Unions
(1880), both organisations being on a national scale. In 1897 the farmers
joined to form the Swiss Farmers' Association. It was only after the turn of
the century, in 1918, that the white-collar workers founded a real
socio-political organisation for themselves. The Association of Trade and
Industry, which is still one of the most powerful interest groups today, was
founded mainly to represent the interests of the employers against the federal
state (for example with the aim of getting protective customs duties
introduced), while the Federation of Trade Unions saw itself right from the
start as representing the workers against the employers. The Social Democrat
Party also dates from this period (1888), and until after the second World War
its policies centred around class differences.

     After the Metal-Workers' and Watch-Makers' Union had been founded and
before the first World War, Switzerland experienced its first major strike,
and in 1908 the Central Federation of Swiss Employers' Organisations was
founded, as a counterpart to the Federation of Trade Unions. After the first
World War and the General Strike various measures were introduced aimed at
protecting the workers and the latter were also able to take advantage of the
general economic expansion. The relationship between labour and capital was to
an increasing extent governed by contracts, which often had to be fought for
through strikes and lockouts. The employers were very slow to recognise the
Unions as negotiating and contracting partners. In 1937 a "peace agreement"
was signed by the Metal-Workers' and Watch-Makers' Union, under the terms of
which negotiations were to be the basis for introducing changes and both sides
were forbidden to use force. Since then relations between the Unions and the
employers have been characterised by a policy of negotiation favoured by the
economic boom of the 50s and the 60s, within whose framework there has been
a predominantly moderate attitude on both sides aimed at encouraging economic
progress in production. This attitude is also partly responsible for the high
investment rate in Switzerland (over a quarter of the gross national product
is invested).

     Despite the poverty experienced by the working class in the 19th century
the workers' movement was weaker in Switzerland than in other European
countries; it only became a radical organisation at the turn of the century.
This may well be due to a great extent to the decentralised economic and
settlement structure, which we have already discussed above, which prevented
workers rushing to the fast growing towns. For a long time industry relied on
the "farming factory workers", who worked in the factories and at the same
time carried on farming their land at subsistence level. Even today there are
no big industrial cities in Switzerland comparable to those in other
industrialised countries. At the present time the proportion of workers who
belong to a union or some other similar organisation is estimated at a third
of the gainfully employed population of Switzerland and is thus one of the
lowest in Europe. This is no doubt an important factor contributing to the
willingness of the Swiss trade unions to settle differences by negotiation.
The relative insignificance of the unions may well have added to the fact that
even during the economic boom salaries never rose as much as productivity and
profits.

5. Economic Development and Employment

     As in the case of the education system, a breakdown of the important
structural changes in the Swiss economy reveals factors which have a direct
influence on working conditions for employees. In order to be able to
appreciate the extent of this influence, let us summarise the most fundamental
changes:

     - Changes in the structure of production: change from outworker system to
factory production, involving a reduction in work volume for outworkers and
the introduction of factory work with fundamental consequences as regards the
social position of workers' families (child labour outside the home, loss of
simultaneous agricultural source of income and consequently more direct
dependence on the well-being of the factory, etc.). At the same time
increasing shift of production and employment from independent craftsmen into
the factory.

     - Drastic fall in the number of people employed in agriculture (farmers,
farm-hands, family helpers) and generally in the proportion of the population
living in rural conditions.

     - Increase in the number of people employed in industry until the middle
of the 20th century, followed by decrease.

     - The fall in employment in agriculture, the transfer of work into the
factories and the merging of these factories into increasingly large companies
lead to an enormous drop in the number of self-employed workers; by far the
largest part of the working population is salaried.

     - Slightly staggered, continual growth in the services sector; increased
polarisation of work into unskilled routine jobs on the one hand and highly
skilled, specialised jobs on the other; at the same time the job market is
becoming increasingly unsafe, especially for the "fringe" workers, such as
older people, women, youths and foreigners.

     - A further trend should be mentioned, although it is difficult to find
an "objective" indication of its existence: the increasing pressure of
production, resulting in stress, felt by employees in every branch and at
every level, which can be seen in the spread of job and work evaluation
systems. This pressure is an individual burden which increases as working
hours are reduced. The families of employees are also affected as they become
more and more a "place" where the breadwinner recuperates from the pressures
of work and thus have to adjust to needs which may easily conflict with those
of other members of the family (especially children and wives).

     - The concentration of far-reaching powers among the largest firms in
various branches and thus also at increasingly high levels leads to a growing
social gulf between those who have these powers and those who are affected by
them. More and more workers are affected by decisions which are taken in
circles far removed from their own daily experience, decisions taken on the
basis of criteria which are often way beyond their own field of comprehension
and which are for them increasingly unfathomable and arbitrary.

     - Since this concentration is mainly on a legal and organisational level
and only leads to very limited expansion in the individual plants, the
traditional imbalance between labour and capital is becoming more exaggerated.
While the unions' membership only represents a limited part of the work-force,
owing to the continued decentralised pattern of employment opportunities and
the increasing hierarchical subdivision according to branches, the employers
have for many decades been well organised and in a position to realise their
aims.

d) Politics

     The most easily visible, organisational framework for the political field
of social activity is the state. However, politics are not limited to the
state: apart from parliament, the government and the civil service, the
political parties and especially the lobbies also play an important role.
Politics and the state are important first of all because they, too, produce
assets which society desires or at least they guarantee the financial and
organisational side of the production and distribution of such assets,
examples of which include state education, the administration of justice,
public transport, part of the health service, social security and many other
state services. The state is moreover a section of society in which tension
and conflict arising in other sections are acted out or at least controlled
according to more or less clearly set out rules. It is because of this dual
role that politics are important in the analysis of the social structure of
Switzerland.

     Like her education system and her economy, Switzerland's political
organisation is a product of the 19th century, still showing traces of a more
distant history and evidence of more recent changes. Up until the French
Revolution there was no state of Switzerland as such but a loose federation of
cantons which were completely independent and not bound by the decisions taken
by the coordinating body. Furthermore, the members of this confederation did
not have equal powers; within the core of the 13 original cantons there were
those which held a dominant position, such as Zurich and Berne, and those
which were virtually powerless, such as Glarus. There were allied members who
enjoyed limited rights, such as the cantons of St. Gall and the Grisons.
Finally there were colonies or dependencies which were ruled by other cantons
alone or jointly; thus the canton of Vaud and Western Argovia belonged to
Berne, while Thurgovia and the Southern Tessin were so-called "common
dominions". This interwoven and hierarchical political structure was
controlled to a large extent by the rich aristocrats and patricians in the
cantonal capitals, which exploited the rural areas through a system by which
the latter provided troops of mercenaries against payment of compensation by
the cantonal government, as well as through many obligatory payments. In this
way the up-and-coming middle classes were not left very much leeway for
business in the towns or in the country.

     This situation changed in 1798 when the French army invaded the canton of
Vaud and occupied Berne after a short battle. In many places the French were
welcomed as liberators and not considered conquerors at all. It is estimated
that 7,000 trees were erected at this time, as symbols of deliverance from the
oppressor. This was the start of a long period of political turmoil: Napoleon
proclaimed a national constitution along French lines, whereby all parts of
Switzerland were equal but at the same time reduced to simple boroughs of a
centrally organised satellite state, dependent on France. This Republic of
Switzerland imposed from outside was largely incapable of functioning, and
after many attempts at revising its form, it was finally abandoned in 1803
through Napoleon's Mediation Act which provided for a confederation of states
based on the American model, where the individual interests of each canton
could be better taken into account.

     This system worked well until Napoleon's fall, and in 1815, after the
Vienna Settlement, it was replaced by a cantonal alliance, the cantons
remaining equal but being completely autonomous in their internal affairs. A
Restoration movement developed between 1815 and 1830 and succeeded, especially
in the catholic cantons of central Switzerland, in bringing the former
patricians and their political organ, the conservative movement, back to
power. Political rights were once again reserved for the wealthy and the
long-established families. In the canton of Argovia, for example, only those
men who possessed more than S.F. 200 in real estate could vote; in Lucerne 20
out of the 36 members of the town council, who were all elected for life, were
patricians, and of them 14 were related to each other.

     The rising middle classes and their political representatives, the
liberals and the radicals, were calling for a broader democratic system and it
was only possible to suppress their demands for a short time. After 1830 there
came a new period of regeneration, especially in the protestant cantons. In
1848, after a short civil war and after the separatist movement of the
catholic, conservative cantons had been put down, the Swiss confederation came
into existence; despite the far-reaching autonomy enjoyed by the cantons, a
strong central government was formed. This state was created out of the
political and military victory won by the liberals and the radicals, and it
was these groups which dominated parliament for several decades because, among
other things, all seven members of the government, elected on a basis of
majority rule, came from among their ranks. This period is popularly known as
the rule of the economic and political "barons". These barons included
prominent entrepreneurs such as the industrialist Alfred Escher, who not only
led the industrial canton of Zurich politically for many years, but also
played an important role in federal politics.

     The newly formed democratic movement objected to this situation, and
their demands met with such strong support among the population that the
federal constitution had to be totally revised in 1874. The introduction of
broader political rights at a cantonal and federal level (referendums and
initiatives) put an end to the domination of the entrepreneurs and their
political representatives.

     The constitution of 1848 had already placed the state above the church;
according to the revised version of 1874 religion was a private matter for the
individual, monasteries were taken over by the state, religious orders were
forbidden and various other anticlerical measures were taken which brought the
conservative movement and the catholic cantons in opposition to the new state.
It was only after a hard struggle for secularisation of the state that the
radicals, the democrats and the conservatives reached a point of
reconciliation in 1891. As confirmation of this, the first conservative was
elected to the government.

     In the meantime those sections of the population who had gained less from
the industrial revolution, i.e. the farmers and the workers, started
organising themselves. However, they were not able to gain any political power
in the federal state until after proportional representation had been
introduced (after the General Strike of 1918). The first elections held
according to the new principles in 1919 brought fundamental changes to the
political composition of the Swiss parliament: the former radicals and
democrats (who had by then merged to form the Liberal Democratic Party) lost
45 of their 105 seats, the Social Democrats doubled their number of seats to
41 and the farmers obtained their first 30 seats. Only the proportion of
conservative Members returned remained approximately unaltered. Since 1919 the
proportion of seats held by the various parties has hardly changed. In 1943
the Social Democrats, who had gone from strength to strength, gained their
first government seat and in 1959 their second. As in the case of the
conservatives before them, the integration of the Social Democrats into the
federal parliament has led to a wave of political moderation, despite the fact
that they only have a limited influence on the political decisions they help
to take.

     There is no doubt that the new federal state endorsed the autonomy of the
cantons in certain areas, such as education. But at the same time it did away
with important barriers, especially economic barriers, between the cantons and
made way for more individual freedom for every member of society, which was
essential for the development of enterprise: equal political rights for all
male citizens regardless of property and titles, freedom of trade, freedom of
movement, abolition of road and bridge tolls, common currency (only through
this measure did Switzerland become a single economic unit), equality of all
citizens before the law and freedom of association.

     The predominance of free rights and the lack of privileges express quite
clearly the ideals which were the aim of the founders of modern Switzerland:
the central government should above all guarantee 1) the abolition of the
restrictions imposed on the people by the Ancient Regime, and 2) the
protection of individual freedom against encroachment by the state itself. In
particular the state should ensure free development of the economy, without
intervening in that domain itself. However, after only a short time the
central authorities had to deal with quite different demands. On the one hand,
during the agricultural crisis in the 1870s industry and agriculture, which
were under pressure from international competition, started calling for a
federal policy of protection. On the other hand, the trade unions and the
socialists demanded protection for the workers from exploitation and poverty.
Since those days the state, which was originally weak from the organisational
and financial points of view, has had to take over more and more
responsibilities and has been granted, against strong opposition, a gradually
increasing budget. However, national expenditure as a proportion of the gross
national product is only 30% (excluding social security), which is the lowest
in the world, despite the fact that it has increased considerably in recent
years. The state's controlling, compensatory and surrogate functions are
distributed very unevenly at the principal levels of political organisation
(federal, cantonal, municipal). Federal functions have increased in particular
in economic affairs, which means for example that the largest increase in
personnel in the civil service departments has been in Finance, Customs and
the Ministry of Economics. Federal expenditure represents 40% of all public
expenditure, that of the cantons and the boroughs being each 30%. Federal
subsidies and their legal share of federal taxes are important financial
sources for the cantons and the boroughs, providing up to 50% of the total
income of the poorer cantons. Subsidies make up about one quarter of the
federal budget and have a certain compensatory effect, in other words if no
subsidies were granted the rich cantons would be richer and the poor cantons
would be poorer. There is also a certain degree of compensation achieved by
the state as regards individual incomes.

     Since today the state encroaches in many different ways upon the lives of
people living in Switzerland, either by dictating, demanding or supporting,
the question of how political decisions are taken is of great importance.
First of all it should be established that through the system of referendums
and initiatives the Swiss electorate does have the final word in many matters.
However, in practice only the most influential movements succeed in running a
political campaign with the necessary funds, and initiatives are very rarely a
direct success. Furthermore, not all important matters are voted on by the
electorate, and plebiscites are prepared and evaluated by political groups
which can have a strong influence on the options put to the vote. Let us now
consider which are the most important lobbies.

     This question can be answered firstly through the institutional structure
of the state; for the sake of simplicity we shall only consider the federal
state, which is based on the principle of the separation of power. The 246
Members of both houses are elected every four years; the Members of the
"Nationalrat" (comparable to the American House of Representatives) are
elected on a basis of proportional representation, and the Members of the
"Standerat" (comparable to the American Senate) are elected by majority vote.
The two houses together then elect from among their Members the seven
ministers who form the government. The two houses, being the legislative body,
form the most open arena of political opinion, while the government is the
executive body. Although it is only partly representative of effective
expression of popular interests let us quickly look at the social composition
of the legislative body. According to the system of election currently used
the composition of both houses corresponds to the opinions of the voters as
expressed at the polls, and in this respect this body is representative.
However, from their social characteristics, the Members elected do not appear
to be representative of the whole population of Switzerland. This is not
surprising but it has, however, an influence on the activities of parliament.
First of all there are no foreigners in the two Houses, although about 15% of
the population of Switzerland are not of Swiss nationality. There are very few
female Members (roughly 10%). Most of the Members have a university degree and
approximately half of them are in the professions. The age structure of
parliament is also different from that of the population as a whole: only
about 10% of the Members are under 40 years of age. Only the two national
religions and the three most important national languages are proportionally
represented in parliament.

     This comparison gives only a limited amount of information about the
social origins of the people who run the country, because the political
exercise of power is not so closely linked to the institutional structure of
the state. Out of the 300 or so people who influenced the most important
decisions taken in federal politics between 1971 and 1975 only 15% were
members of parliament. The rest were representatives of political lobbies
(37%), ministers and top people in the civil service (25%), cantonal
politicians (19%) and experts (4%). The differences between the broad mass of
the public and the small circle of people who take political decisions are
even bigger than those which emerge from the comparison with the legislative
body. Here it is not only the foreigners, women and the younger generation
which are very much under-represented, but also the workers and the political
left. In contrast the groups over-represented include university graduates,
professional politicians and officers. The large proportion of professional
politicians, especially the representatives of the trade unions, political
parties and the many economic lobbies, illustrates first the fact that the
framework within which important political decisions are taken is not
identical with the state and its central organs, and secondly, how closely
bound politics and the economy are. This can also be seen in the fact that
between two-thirds and three-quarters of the non-socialist members of
parliament are at the same time on the board of directors of important firms
in the industrial or services sectors. Thus these companies are in constant
and direct contact with the political scene.

     Let us now consider how the structure of Switzerland's political system
takes into account the conflicts and problems arising in other areas of its
social structure. In simple terms one can say that two basic conflicts are
especially well "catered for", both of them centering around typical,
historical inequality in Swiss society. The first is that between federalism
and centralism, which is based on the centuries-old inequality between the
cantons, and the second is that between labour and capital, which took on a
more important aspect in particular at the turn of the century. To say that
these two conflicts are well taken into account within the political system
does not mean that the problems have been solved, but that committees and
procedures have been set up whereby the representatives of the most important
groups affected by a certain problem can have their say and exercise a certain
amount of influence. One of the most important dispositions in this respect is
the consultation system, by which before any important political decision is
taken all the interested parties, as well as the cantons and the political
parties, are consulted. The principle of "democracy by agreement", which aims
at balancing out the difference in interests, has a strong influence on most
of the other committees and procedures. Thus, for example, the most important
lobbies are represented in the so-called panels of experts, with the result
that the suggestions they make are already in fact political compromises
before they go through the consultation procedure, official processes and
parliamentary debate. In this case the attitude taken is influenced mainly by
the "fighting strength" of the lobbies involved. One of their classical ways
of making themselves heard is to threaten to demand a referendum on any
decision which is not to their liking.

     In Switzerland there exists a "magic formula" to take into account the
class problem. According to an agreement reached between the four main
parties, the seven government seats have, since 1959, been shared out between
them as follows: 2 for the Liberals, 2 for the Christian Democrats, 2 for the
Social Democrats and 1 for the Swiss People's Party (farmers and the middle
classes). Thus the political left has only a minority representation of 2
seats in the government, although according to the current principle applied
in the government the Social Democrats carry the same responsibility as the 5
other (non-socialist) ministers.

     The most important example of official allowances being made for the
problems arising from federalism is the system by which bills and initiatives
or referendums are passed. In order for a bill to be successful it must be
passed by a majority vote in both Houses; an initiative or a referendum must
be accepted by the majority of the voters as a whole and by the majority of
cantons, the same votes being counted to give a result for each canton.

     In recent years it has occasionally happened that important bills have
been accepted by the majority of the voters who live in the industrialised
cantons and in the towns, but have been thwarted by a majority of
negative-voting, low population cantons.

     If one compares the two "institutionalised" points of conflict with the
list of structural changes which have taken place, especially in the economy
and in employment, it is easy to think that the structure of the political
system reflects more strongly the problems of the 19th century, i.e. of the
period when the system was born, than those of more recent times. We shall go
back to this supposition in Chapter 6.

e) Social Sectors and the Exercise of Power

     Through the examples of education, the economy and politics we have shown
in this chapter how social assets and individual standard of living are
dependent on the more comprehensive organisation of society. In all three
fields characteristics of structure and historical development were exposed,
which are of far-reaching importance in the life of the individual in
Switzerland and which cannot be automatically influenced by him.

     One of the most important trends and structural characteristics is the
increasing social division and the sub-division of each social sector into
hierarchical and specialised categories. The consequence of this trend is that
for most people their sphere of personal experience is becoming more
individual because the various ways of belonging to social sectors comprise
different factors for each individual. For this reason it is becoming
increasingly difficult to discover that one shares certain problems with
someone else, and there is a stronger tendency to look for the root of one's
discontentment within oneself.

     In addition, the framework within which the individual gains his
experience, in particular in his career but also in the political or consumer
field, is broadening, while the social decision-making power is being
centralised to such an extent that the individual will rarely be directly
aware of it. We have been able to find various examples of this concentration
trend in the economy and in politics. At the highest level of social
decision-making there is a web of power, socially apparent in the uniformity
of the powerful elite and organisationally apparent in the growing importance
of employers' and workers' organisations. It is true to say that at the
highest level of power it is not so important to distinguish between the
different social sectors, as we have done so far, as several leading roles in
politics and economics are often filled by the same person at any one time or
in immediate succession. The decision-makers do indeed represent population
groups with varying and even to a certain extent opposing interests. Through
the fact that they are all leaders of their respective organisations and deal
with each other in this capacity, they have many common problems, experiences
and aims.

     By analysing the three social sectors education, the economy and politics
and the relationship between them we have become aware of important features
of the social structure of Switzerland. The federal side of education,
however, has revealed that our image is incomplete. We must now examine the
municipal and cantonal structure of Swiss society.