The political system
The Swiss Confederation, today made up of 26 cantons, has been in existence since 1848. The Government (Federal Council) is a collegial body consisting of 7 members (from 2016: 2 FDP, 2 SP, 2 SVP, 1 CVP). They are elected by both chambers in parliament: the National Council (representing the people, 200 seats) and the Council of States (representing the cantons, 46 seats). The Swiss political system is also characterised by far-reaching democratic rights (right to submit initiatives and request referendums) and popular votes.
National Council Elections, 2019
| Share of the votes in % | Seats | Women | Men | Percentage of women | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FDP | 15.1 | 29 | 10 | 19 | 34.5 |
| CVP | 11.4 | 25 | 7 | 18 | 28.0 |
| SP | 16.8 | 39 | 25 | 14 | 64.1 |
| SVP | 25.6 | 53 | 13 | 40 | 24.5 |
| GLP | 7.8 | 16 | 8 | 8 | 50.0 |
| BDP | 2.4 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 33.3 |
| GPS | 13.2 | 28 | 17 | 11 | 60.7 |
| Other parties 1 | 7.3 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 42.9 |
1 EVP (3 seats, 2 women), CSP, PdA (1 seat), Sol. (1 seat, 1 woman), SD, EDU (1 seat), Lega (1 seat), MCR.
See below for abbreviations
National Council Elections 2019
In the 2019 National Council elections, the greatest increases were made by the two green parties, the Swiss Green Party (the Greens) and the Swiss Green Liberal Party (the Green Liberals). The Greens increased their share of the vote by 6.1 percentage points to 13.2% and the Green Liberals by 3.2 percentage points to 7.8%. The party that lost the greatest share of votes in the 2019 National Council elections was the SVP with a drop of 3.8 percentage points. However, with 25.6% of the vote, they remain the National Council’s strongest party. As well as the SVP, the other three Federal Council parties, the FDP, CVP and SP also suffered losses in the vote share; all three obtained the worst result in their party’s history.
Parties abbreviations
| FDP Radical Democratic Party 1 | EVP Evangelical People’s Party | GPS Green Party of Switzerland |
| CVP Christian Democratic People’s Party | PCS Partito cristiano sociale | SD Swiss Democrats |
| SP Social Democratic Party | GLP Green Liberal Party | EDU Federal democratic union |
| SVP Swiss People’s Party | PdA Labour Party | Lega Lega dei Ticinesi |
| BDP Conservative Democratic Party | Sol. Solidarity | MCR Mouvement Citoyens Romand1 |
2009: merger of the FDP (Free Democratic Party) with the LPS (Liberal Party) under the designation “RDP. The Liberals“
National participation in referendums and elections
While voter participation stood at 80% in the 1919 National Council elections, this was followed by a continuous decline reaching a temporary low of 42% during the 1990s. Since then a slight recovery to over 48% has been observed. In the 2019 National Council elections, however, this rate sank again for the first time to 45%. In contrast, voter participation in national popular votes has been influenced by considerable variations due to different ballot proposals. While voter participation in national popular votes declined in the 1980s, it has since stabilised. It even increased slightly in the last five years to 45% compared with the 1990s (43%) and 1980s (40%), reaching roughly the same level as that of the National Council elections.
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