Understanding Swiss Party Systems: The Evolution and Impact of Swiss Political Institutions

1. Swiss politics and political institutions:5. Party system and parties Prof. Dr. Andreas Ladner iMPA 2012

2. Module 1 • Society and History • Federalism and Municipalities • Government and Parliament • Direct Democracy • Party system and Parties • What about the citizens?

3. Party systems = a set of one (?) two or more parties. (see China, US and CH) There is more about a party system than the number of parties!

4. How to explain the existence of party systems? • Institutional theories • Historic theories on crises and transformation • Theories of modernization

5. Lipset/Rokkan (1967):two revolutions and four cleavages national and industrial revolution: Centre – Periphery, State – Church, Owner – Worker,Industry - Land

6. The four cleavages • Centre – Periphery: The division between elites in the urban areas, and those in more outlying areas. (Liberals – Christian Democrats) • State – Church: A division between religious and secular voters. (Liberals – Christian Democrats) • Owner – Worker - A class cleavage, causing the formation of parties of the left and parties of the right. Sometimes it is argued that this cleavage represents a conflict between the rich and poor. (Liberals – Social Democrats) • Land – Industry - Continued state exercise of control over tariffs (customs) against freedom of control for industrial enterprise. (Liberals – Swiss People’s Party)

7. Remember? Cross-cutting Cleavages F cath. French speaking, Catholics, poor rich poor prot. G German speaking, protestants, rich cath. rich poor prot.

8. Frozen Party System – These: "... the party systems of the 1960's reflect, with a few but significant exceptions the cleavage structures of the 1920's. This is a crucial characteristics of Western competitive politics in the age of "high mass consumption": the party alternatives, and in remarkably many cases the party organizations, are older than the majorities of the national electorates.” (Lipset/Rokkan 1967: 50)

9. Kirchheimer (1965: 32) suggest a slightly different concept: the catch-all party • Ideology and cleavages lose their importance • Party leaders become more important • Party members become less important • The party is mainly interested in votes

10. Characteristics of party systems • Number of parties • Volatility • Type of parties

11. „Effective number of parties “ Laakso/Taagepera (1979) : pi is the percentage of votes of a party.

12. The fragmentation of the Swiss party system compared

13. „Volatility“ Pedersen (1979) : n is the number of parties, vit is the percentage of votes of party i at time t and vi(t+1) the percentage of votes of party i at time t + 1..

14. Increasing volatility

15. What kind of parties? The big parties 1919 – 2007 28.9 % 19.5 % 15.8 % 14.6 % 9.6 %

16. What kind of parties? The small parties

17. High polarization of the Swiss party system

18. Swiss parties

19. Four „older“ ones and a rather „new“ party • Social Democrats: Social security, solidarity, openness, environment • Radicals: knowledge, openness, fairness, growth, against bureaucracy • Christian Democrats: attractive business location, family, social security • Swiss People‘s Party: Against European integration, against immigration, lower tax burden • Greens: climate protection, reorganisation of the economy along more environmental lines, the strengthening of social institution and an active policy of peace

20. The emergence of the Swiss parties • Organisations of the citizens entitled to vote („Children of the popular rights“) • Bottom-up: first organisation in the cantons • National party organisation • Social Democrats (1888) • Liberal Party (1894) • Christian Democrats (1912) • Swiss People’s Party (1936) • Greens (1983)

21. Party organisations Rather weak and small. Parties belong to the civil society. • No constitutional recognition (Art. 137, since 2000) • Interest groups (and social movements) play an important role; consultation process opens the decision making process, direct democracy • Weak national party organisation, limited resources, low number of professional staff, heterogenous

22. Party members 1997-2007 Quelle: Gunzinger 2008

23. Average membership fees (in sFr.)

24. Internal funding cantonal parties (percentages)

26. Number of professional staff (national parties) Vgl. Seminararbeit von Michael Bühler 2006

27. Ideological heterogeneity

28. Candates National Election: Social Democrats and Swiss People‘ s Party

29. Candidates: Liberals, Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Swiss People‘s Party, Green liberals, Greens

30. Political Differences among the MPs of the different Parties

31. www.euprofiler.eu

32. Seven policy dimensions and 28 questions • Wirtschaftliche Liberalisierung = economic liberalization • Restriktive Finanzpolitik = restrictive financial policy • Justiz und Innere Sicherheit = law and order • Restriktive Einwanderungspolitik = restrictive immigration policy • Umweltschutz = pro environment • Ausbau des Sozialstaates = pro welfare state • Liberale Gesellschaft = liberal society

33. Party families (1)

34. Party families (2)

35. Homogeneity of the different party families

36. Liberal parties (Switzerland and Germany)

37. Liberal parties (GB, NL, DK)

38. Christian Democrats (Switzerland and Germany)

39. Union pour une majorité populaire (France)

40. Green parties (CH, Germany and Austria)

41. Social Democrats in Switzerland and Germany

42. Labour (Engl.), PS (France) und SAP (Sweden)

43. Swiss People‘s Party, FPOe und Vlaams Belang

44. SVP and PVV (Geert Wilders)