Professional Documents
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Within their range of powers the cantons also had to find solutions
to the conflicts around diversity within the canton, in particular with
regard to the different religious and language communities.
Moreover, cantons have the power to organize themselves. For this
reason there are important differences among the cantons with
regard to the scope of autonomy of municipalities, including districts
and agglomerations. Municipalities of cantons influenced by French
political culture are granted less powers in comparison to Germanspeaking cantons.6
Besides their power to organize themselves by their own
constitution, cantons have the power and responsibility to provide
for security of the people, to guarantee mandatory primary
education, to promote and protect their culture, to protect the
environment and implement federal environmental standards, to
build roads, and to provide, within the limits of the federal
legislation, for cantonal development with regard to environment
protection, housing, agriculture, and economy. The cantons are also
the holders of public water and water resources (including hydroenergy), of forests, game, and fishing. The new constitution even
enlarged cantonal powers in the field of foreign relations. Cantons
are now expressly empowered to conclude treaties with other local
authorities on all issues which are within the scope of their
autonomy.7
Constitutional Framework
Executive
The Swiss Federal Council is a seven-member executive council that
heads the federal administration, operating as a combination
cabinet and collective presidency. Any Swiss citizen eligible to be a
member of the National Council can be elected; candidates do not
have to register for the election, or to actually be members of the
National Council. The Federal Council is elected by the Federal
Assembly for a four-year term.
The largely ceremonial President and Vice President of the
Confederation are elected by the Federal Assembly from among the
members of the Federal Council for one-year term that run
concurrently. The President has almost no powers over and above
his or her six colleagues, but undertakes representative functions
normally performed by a president or prime minister in singleexecutive systems.
6 Ibid
7 Ibid
The National Council has 200 members and is elected every four
years according to a specially sophisticated version of the
proportional election system allowing for the proportional
representation of political parties as well as for the selection of
personalities. Every of the 26 cantons is a constituency, so the
proportional representation is not absolute: a few small cantons may
only send one deputee, while the largest cantons have up to about
30 seats.
The Council of States has 46 members, two per full and one per
half canton. The cantons may decide themselves in their cantonal
constitution who is going to represent them and how long the period
of office is. In most cantons the members of the Council of States
are elected in a majority election on the same day the election for
the National Council takes place.9
8http://www.thomasfleiner.ch/files/categories/IntensivkursII/Switzerla
ndg3.pdf
9 http://direct-democracy.geschichte-schweiz.ch/switzerlandspolitical-systems.html
Judicial
With regard to the Judiciary, Switzerland has followed the concept of
federalism within the civil law system. Accordingly, unlike in the US
and in some other common law federal countries, there is no
dualism between the federal and the state judiciary. There is in
Switzerland only one judiciary which has the power to apply federal
and cantonal law. Unlike in Belgium where the Judiciary is
centralized, the main pillar of the Swiss judiciary are the cantonal
courts organized by the cantons. The cantonal courts have the
power to interpret and to apply federal law as well as the respective
cantonal law. The Federal Supreme Court has mainly an appellate
function with regard to the cantonal courts.10
Cantonal Courts
Civil law, criminal law, and even federal administrative law
implemented by cantonal legislation are first controlled by cantonal
courts. The cantons have the constitutional power and responsibility
to implement federal law8. With regard to criminal law, it is the
cantonal prosecutor who has to prosecute persons suspected of
having violated criminal law and to charge them before the cantonal
judge for having breached criminal law.
However, the judicial system of Switzerland has its flaw because the
Federal Supreme Court currently has no power to review the
constitutionality of federal legislation. Moreover, in general it has no
power to review acts of the federal parliament and of the federal
council (executive). The Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland
cannot review federal statutes which might violate constitutionally
guaranteed cantonal powers. There is no court supervision which
could impede the federal legislator intervening in constitutionally
guaranteed cantonal sovereignty. However, Swiss history has shown
that the popular power to ask for a referendum with regard to
federal legislation has had an important impact in preventing the
Swiss legislator from violating cantonal powers guaranteed by the
constitution.11