Government Regulation and the Business Mind

Abstract

sidered an integral element of national unity, great care is taken to preserve the integrity of all the national languages and to keep the linguistic equilibrium intact. Thus, by unwritten law, at least two, and often three, of the seven places on the Federal Council, which is the Swiss cabinet, have always been reserved for Frenchand Italian-speaking confederates, and only four or five members of the Federal Council can be citizens of German-speaking cantons. Similar informal arrangements also prevail in the selection of justices for the Federal Tribunal. In summary, the linguistic equilibrium which represents one of the foremost stabilizing and integrating influences in the modern Swiss democracy and which is the envy of a strife-torn world, originated at a time before language was made a symbol of rampant nationalism and has been kept on an even keel for more than a century mainly because of a fortunate balancing of demographic factors. It. is quite true, however, that this demographic equilibrium has also been consciously reinforced through wise and statesmanlike political measures designed to prevent any upsets and disturbances throughout an era when other countries have permitted language to become a focus of conflict and division.