Referendum on Immigration in Switzerland

Abstract

Referendums are one of the pillars of Swiss democracy. Due to them, citizens have the opportunity to directly express their opinion on particular issues of the political life. One of these referendums was held on September 27, 2020. The most discussed issue was the initiative «For proportionate immigration», put forward by the nationalist Swiss people’s party (SVP). It assumed the return of control over migration processes to the jurisdiction of Bern and, accordingly, the termination of one of the seven sectoral agreements between Switzerland and the European Union. The main political forces of the country (Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Liberals, Greens), as well as trade unions and employers' associations did not support the proposal of the nationalists. They formed a Committee of resistance. In the end, the «For proportionate immigration» initiative received only 38,29% of electoral support and, consequently, was not adopted. The author comes to the conclusion that the main reason for the failure of the SVP initiative was the awareness of the Swiss that the break of one sectoral agreement with Brussels will lead to the denunciation of the entire package of agreements and, consequently, to a sharp decrease in the degree of interaction between Switzerland and the EU member-states. Thus, the referendum became a serious political defeat for the nationalists, and Switzerland retained its former level of relations with the EU.