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Switzerland, Public Policy in

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Encyclopedia of Public Policy

Introduction

Three peculiarities of the Swiss political system must be considered when assessing the institutional venues in which policymaking occurs and the resources and effective power of different policy stakeholders. First, direct democracy instruments allow policy actors to put a new policy issue on the political agenda (by launching a popular initiative) and to veto a policy solution that was enacted by the parliament (by calling for an ex post referendum). Second, Switzerland is characterized by strong federalism: the subnational entities (cantons) can co-determine the formulation of federal policies and, furthermore, have significant manoeuvrability when implementing these policies. In addition, cantons have important policy competences in several areas, including health care, public order and security, or education. They also negotiate hundreds of inter-cantonal agreements to address tax and finance, research, or cultural issues. Third, the Federal Assembly (i.e. Swiss...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Science and International Relations, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

    Frédéric Varone

  2. Institute of Political Science and Oeschger Center for Climate Change Research, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland

    Karin Ingold

  3. Environmental Social Science Department Eawag, Zurich, Switzerland

    Karin Ingold

Authors
  1. Frédéric Varone
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  2. Karin Ingold
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Frédéric Varone .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Social and Public Policy, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland

    Minna van Gerven

  2. Department of Political Science, University of Montreal, Montréal, Canada

    Christine Rothmayr Allison

  3. Institute of Political Science, University of Münster, Münster, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

    Klaus Schubert

Section Editor information

  1. Department of Social and Public Policy, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland

    Minna van Gerven

  2. Department of Political Science, University of Montreal, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

    Christine Rothmayr Allison

  3. Institute for Political Science, Universität Münster, Münster, Germany

    Klaus Schubert

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Varone, F., Ingold, K. (2023). Switzerland, Public Policy in. In: van Gerven, M., Rothmayr Allison, C., Schubert, K. (eds) Encyclopedia of Public Policy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-90434-0_54-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-90434-0_54-1

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