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Comment by dgb23 | Hacker News Reader

As a counterweight from a Swiss:

Yes, Switzerland is in many ways liberal, but I think there are other major factors that the article misses.

For one, our infrastructure is in large parts owned by the public. Energy production is owned by cantons, public transportation and telecommunocations are owned by the confederation. Infrastructure investments are streamlined and funded in a very efficient way.

Secondly we have a consensus government. It was shortly mentioned but the article doesn‘t give it enough credit. I‘m horrified by political news from other European countries and the US, who have competitive governments. So much energy is wasted by political ping pong and permanent campaigning. In contrast: compromises formed by all major parties lead to stability and markets _thrive_ in stability. It’s boring but effective and it compounds.

Third is pure luck. We are simply in a geographic region that has always been economically active.

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You also vote so often on public topics that it takes the sting out of politics.

In a standard country, you have only one chance in 4 or 5 years to change your politicians and then basically have to put up with everything the winners come up with, checks and balances notwithstanding. And the candidates are chasing enormous power.

In CH, the threat of a hostile referendum is always hanging over the heads of your politicians. Their position of power over their voters is much weaker than elsewhere.

I envy you your system. I wish we adopted it in 1990 after the Velvet Revolution. By now, our people would have learnt how to use it and would tame the excesses of the first years.

"We are simply in a geographic region that has always been economically active."

So is Iraq (since Antiquity) or South Africa (since the Age of Sail).

> You also vote so often on public topics that it takes the sting out of politics.

The sort of direct democracy of Switzerland is something that is sorely lacking in all other western democracies. It's pretty clear that representative democracy doesn't work anymore (if it ever had).

Direct democracy can only work if fundamental rights are also protected, otherwise it just turns into the tyranny of the majority.

One of the other things that strikes me about Switzerland compared to the US . . . there is no single President; there is a council, and the position of "head of state" is just a "first among equals" role which rotates through the council.

The older I get, I think one of the major flaws of the US system was creating a sole President. The great strengths of the US Constitution over many European ones (even given today's craziness) is that it explicitly sets up checks and balances amongst both the branches of the Federal government and between the states and the Feds. And it also uses the Bill of Rights to essentially ban even the most popular laws if they infringe fundamental human rights.

But despite all that, the singular President has turned into a king-like figure, because we can't seem to get around the fundamental human tendency to want a strongman leader. And this along with toxic partisanship is beginning to corrode everything I mentioned above. I really wonder if the Founders made a mistake not splitting executive power up amongst 3-5 people, merely because it might have counteracted this "worship the strong man" tendency in the human psyche.

I wonder how the US or any other presidential systems would look like with a rule "for every 25 per cent of the vote, the particular candidate gets a year in power".

Capital wants a king-like figure in this moment, not human nature, nor The People.

Capital, in an existing capitalist system, never wants an actual (as opposed to a distracting but powerless figurehead, which they might want) king-like figure (because such a figure is a transfer of power from capital as the existing ruling class to the monarch-like leader), but it is also structurally vulnerable to the emergence of such figures because for each individual capitalist there is an incentive to cooperate with any emerging king-like figure to receive favorable treatment over other capitalists.

This is one of the areas where a popular leftist mantra tends to be right in its conclusion (“Capital will always side with fascism”)—and this works for a wide variety of authoritarianisms that don’t overtly seek the utter destruction of private capital, not just fascism in the narrow sense—but exactly backwards in its rationale (“because fascism does not threaten capital”, when in fact the reason is because fascism does threaten capital, but does so both less and less immediately for capital that cooperates with it than capital that resists.)

Capital seems to work well in Switzerland too, where there is no opportunity for a king-like figure to arise.

Capital wants clear and stable rules. If a king can provide those, then Capital likes the king. I'm not sure clarity and stability of rules is a property of the upcoming american monarchy.

Capital likes clear and stable rules provided there is no opportunity to gut that stability for immense immediate personal gain, fuck the future.

When such an opportunity appears, capital jumps at it. It did it in Russia in the 90s and it's doing it in the US right now.

Any statement like 'Capital wants' is foolish. Because by nature there is competition, and very few things beyond the basics are good for all capital.

And if anything history often shows that capital doesn't want a king while the people demand it.

"And it also uses the Bill of Rights to essentially ban even the most popular laws if they infringe fundamental human rights." paraphrasing George Carlin: There is no such thing as Rights. Only privileges which can be revoked on a whim.

>In CH, the threat of a hostile referendum is always hanging over the heads of your politicians. Their position of power over their voters is much weaker than elsewhere.

Don't many US states have ballot initiatives? How is this different than that?

Well said. Yes, direct democracy is the most cherished part of our politics. It also contributes to stability and decentralizes power as you said.

Fellow Swiss here. I mostly agree. I think the consensus government is incredibly important. I think that style of governments lead to a system where the polices stay along the center of the opinion of people more or less. That leads to some progress (voting for woman) being late, but it also leads to no share turns and extreme adoption of one position or another. Even when those positions are reversed, they often leave behind some institutional decay.

Another factor outside of consensus government is the federalism of government. From outside people would not believe how federal Switzerland is. In terms of school system, you can take the train, go 5 villages over and the school system might be very different. Along with many other things that would be different.

The amount of federalism Switzerland is comparable to what the US has, except Switzerland has it for areas that would be counties in the US.

What this prevents is the ultra dominance of capital city regions like England or France has. Infrastructure is developed for the whole country (even if the French speaking parts endlessly complain about not getting enough, arguably for good reason).

I would say, one of secret of Swiss success is simply, don't do anything really badly. Everything is somewhere between good and great.

One of the things I think we are not very good at is digital government, but because the old school government works pretty good and government is pretty responsive its not as big a deal. But I would love to be Estonia level with that. This is one case were federalism makes things harder.

I think a huge part of a functional consensus government working is delegation of power to the cantons. When citizens own and oversee largely local projects, there is less conflict and more civic ownership and pride.

For Americans, Imagine if the majority of your tax money was directed and spent at your county, not state level. What might your schools and infrastructure look like?

For context, California has 8 counties more populous than the largest Swiss canton.

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