Switzerland votes to curb EU immigration

[Capetan Mihali]

They have a lot of those referendums and often about boring sounding stuff:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_eidgen%C3%B6ssischen_Volksabstimmungen

I see.

Looking through Google Translate, the most recent ones all seem like ones worth voting in.  Though I'd probably skip the Bundesbeschluss vom 15. März 2012 über die Jugendmusikförderung (Gegenentwurf zur Volksinitiative «jugend + musik») myself.

[Zanza]

Looks like they mean it.

Swiss-EU power talks on hold after immigration vote

(Reuters) The European Commission has stopped talks with Switzerland on a cross-border electricity agreement, a spokeswoman for the EU executive said on Monday, following the country's referendum vote to curtail immigration.

The Commission has been seeking closer power trading ties with Switzerland to complement a common energy market for the 28-strong European Union, which it has a deadline to complete this year.

But it said that talks with Bern about a scheme to make it easier to trade energy could not continue without wider political clarity.

"No technical negotiations on the electricity agreement between Switzerland and the EU are foreseen for the moment," Commission spokeswoman Sabine Berger said. "The way forward needs to be analysed in view of the broader context of the bilateral relations."

Separately, senior European officials said Switzerland could lose its privileged access to the European single market in general following the narrow vote in the referendum on Sunday.

Free movement of people and jobs within its borders is one of the fundamental policies of the EU, and Switzerland, while not a member of the bloc, has participated under a pact with Brussels.

Late last year, EU Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger had said the Commission was in intense negotiations with Switzerland to integrate it into the bloc's single energy market.

Swiss participation is important for extending the common energy market for countries such as Italy, which border Switzerland.

Even if the regulations on a single market can be hammered out, the European Union still has a huge task ahead to create all the necessary infrastructure for a single energy area.

The Commission has succeeded in encouraging a process called market-coupling, which links together electricity exchanges and standardises trading rules.

[Syt]

They have a lot of those referendums and often about boring sounding stuff:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_eidgen%C3%B6ssischen_Volksabstimmungen

I guess that's why people are in general ok with a representative deomcracy - so they don't have to deal with all the boring shit that running a country entails.

[Zanza]

Tierseuchengesetz (animal disease law) for example sounds like something that should best be left to technocrats. Who cares for that except a few farmers?

[alfred russel]

I have a feeling that the many No-voting Swiss residing or traveling through the rest of Europe for the next 3 years are going to have an experience a little reminiscent of Democrat-voting Americans abroad during the core of the Bush years...

I seriously doubt it. I think all sorts of anti immigration referenda would pass in europe if the countries had the political structure and autonomy to put them to votes. See the comment sections from euro newspapers being posted here. Some people will see the Swiss as heroic, and some will be worried their own country will go down a similar path.

[alfred russel]

The Swiss only agreed to join the Schengen area when there was the risk of them losing other bilateral treaties with the EU

No, what is at stake here is what was called the "Bilateral Treaties I" from 1999, a set of seven treaties between Switzerland and the EU.
Schengen was part of the set called "Bilateral Treaties II" from 2004.

The approach of holding an economic knife to country's throats to keep them in line is bound to backfire--voters are not necessarily rational actors.

It was already a mistake to conclude the original Bilateral Treaties and the EU commission said as much when the question came up to adapt them to recent legal developments in the EU. We should just have offered Switzerland to join the EEA or not. If they now opt out of one of the major parts of the Bilateral Treaties, we should just cancel them wholesale and treat Switzerland like every other non-EU country again. It's not holding the knife at their throat, it's offering them to be a club member and play by the rules or not.

My understanding, which could be wrong because this goes back a long time and I'm hardly all that interested in Switzerland, is that they signed on to the Schengen Agreement with some hint that otherwise a guillotine clause in earlier agreements might be executed and would allow the EU to cancel all of the earlier bilateral agreements.

Switzerland is a small landlocked country in the middle of the EU. Granted, the EU has no obligation to include it in its common market. But putting up a bunch of trade barriers because it wants some theoretical control over its own migration policy doesn't seem reasonable either.

[Zanza]

No idea. Without any source the German language Wiki article on those treaties says that the EU commission didn't want to conclude the Bilaterals II. The EU commission has since decided that there will be no more special treaties with Switzerland unless Switzerland agrees to a mechanism similar to EEA which makes EU law automatically applicable in Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein. The EU commission isn't really a fan of these cherry-picking special treaties, which is not surprising.

It would also not be the EU that cancels the earlier agreements. The Swiss government now has a constitutional mandate to cancel one of them and the agreed upon mechanism was that guillotine clause, which would then mean that the Swiss government would cancel all of them by canceling the one on freedom of movement. The EU is happy enough with the status quo, the Swiss want change. Blaming the EU here is barking at the wrong tree.

The EU has zero obligations towards Switzerland other than those in the bilateral treaties. Just like Switzerland considers itself a "Willensnation", meaning a nation built on a voluntary association of different ethnicities in a common state, the EU is also a "Willens"-organisation and Switzerland made abundantly clear that they don't want to be part of it.

[alfred russel]

No idea. Without any source the German language Wiki article on those treaties says that the EU commission didn't want to conclude the Bilaterals II. The EU commission has since decided that there will be no more special treaties with Switzerland unless Switzerland agrees to a mechanism similar to EEA which makes EU law automatically applicable in Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein. The EU commission isn't really a fan of these cherry-picking special treaties, which is not surprising.

It would also not be the EU that cancels the earlier agreements. The Swiss government now has a constitutional mandate to cancel one of them and the agreed upon mechanism was that guillotine clause, which would then mean that the Swiss government would cancel all of them by canceling the one on freedom of movement. The EU is happy enough with the status quo, the Swiss want change. Blaming the EU here is barking at the wrong tree.

The EU has zero obligations towards Switzerland other than those in the bilateral treaties. Just like Switzerland considers itself a "Willensnation", meaning a nation built on a voluntary association of different ethnicities in a common state, the EU is also a "Willens"-organisation and Switzerland made abundantly clear that they don't want to be part of it.

I think the EU is a fan of cherry picking the Schengen Agreement. The UK, Ireland, Croatia, Romania, and Bulgaria come to mind.

That said, I don't think it is crazy for the Swiss to want to control migration to their country. Obviously that means the relationship terms with the EU need to be renegotiated. If the EU wants to set terms such as similar restrictions on Swiss working in the EU, and perhaps some minor restrictions on accessing the common market, that seems reasonable. However, I think (maybe incorrectly) that some people seem to have the attitude, "if you want out of schengen, fine, keep your products out of the common market". That doesn't seem reasonable from my point of view.

[Zanza]

The EU would love to have all agreements applicable for all countries, but the member countries often want exemptions and asterisks and so on and so forth in every single agreement the EU makes. It's just a huge bargain. A similar mechanism as the silly earmarks in American acts of congress.

The UK and Ireland got an opt-out to the best-known part of the Schengen Agreement, abolition of passport controls, when it was negotiated. They are party to other parts of the Schengen Agreement, namely police and judiciary cooperation, though.
Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria are contractually obligated to join Schengen in the future so they must work towards fulfilling the criteria and will then be admitted. Just like they got admitted to all the other European Treaties. They never got the option to cherry-pick like Switzerland either and needed to agree to the full package. Some of the parts of the Schengen agreement are already in force for Romania and Bulgaria, Croatia is planned to join in 2015. Cyprus is also not part of Schengen due to its unclear border situation with North Cyprus.

The European common market is about four freedoms: goods, services, capital, persons. If Switzerland now wants an exemption from one of these four freedoms, namely the free movement of persons, why is it unreasonable to exclude them from the other freedoms? Why are persons somehow less deserving of freedom than goods, services or capital?

They would get the same deal as e.g. the USA. Still a very important trading partner for the EU, but just not part of its common market anymore. The EU is a very open market for most commodities, so Switzerland could still sell most of their stuff, like e.g. chemicals, pharmaceuticals etc. They would obviously need to fulfill all the necessary regulations and I assume those are quite a bit more tedious for non-EU-producers. I guess some commodities such as agricultural products would be a problem as the EU has a fairly closed market for these. Swiss citizens could still apply for a work visas just like Americans or Europeans in Switzerland. So in general, unless you consider the market access US companies and citizens have to the EU "unreasonable", the access for Switzerland wouldn't be unreasonable either.

Switzerland could stay in Schengen just fine by the way, that's a different treaty. It's admittedly hard to imagine a reintroduction of custom controls along the Swiss border without passport checks, but they could probably continue to participate in the other parts of the Schengen agreement, same as Ireland and UK. As far as I know the Bilaterals II, which Schengen is part of, are not covered under the guillotine clause of the Bilaterals I.

[alfred russel]

I don't know all the ins and outs of the treaties. I thought the common market was distinct from the migration stuff (which is about being in the EU) which is distinct from Schengen.

Anyway, it shouldn't be too complex to have a separate set of rules for Switzerland. Along with Norway, they are the only country in the central / western european region not in the EU (I don't think I'm forgetting anyone).

[Syt]

Iceland, but they're inbred island hicks, anyways.

[Zanza]

I thought the common market was distinct from the migration stuff (which is about being in the EU)

No. Here is the definition of the internal market:

Article 26, paragraph 2 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union:
The internal market shall comprise an area without internal frontiers in which the free movement of goods, persons, services and capital is ensured in accordance with the provisions of the Treaties.

which is distinct from Schengen.

Yes, Schengen is a different set of treaties and has nothing to do with the internal market. It's about border controls and cross-country cooperation for law enforcement.

The freedom of movement for workers was one of the core founding principles of the EEC in 1957 (and goes back to the ECSC of 1951). Schengen is a much newer treaty and was first discussed in the late 1980s and implemented during the 1990s (or 2008 in Switzerland's case).

Anyway, it shouldn't be too complex to have a separate set of rules for Switzerland. Along with Norway, they are the only country in the central / western european region not in the EU (I don't think I'm forgetting anyone).

The EU would be totally fine with Switzerland getting the same rules as Norway (and Iceland and Liechtenstein), meaning Switzerland joins the EEA. Of course the core principles of the EEA are the four freedoms, one of which Switzerland now wants to abolish. Switzerland voted against joining the EEA in 1992 though and that made those bilateral treaties necessary in the first place. If they would - for whatever reason - now agree to get the same deal as Norway, the EU would be delighted. That has long been the strategic goal of the EU in EU-Swiss relations. It has a chance of 0% in Swiss political reality however.

[Iormlund]

I don't know all the ins and outs of the treaties. I thought the common market was distinct from the migration stuff (which is about being in the EU) which is distinct from Schengen.

Anyway, it shouldn't be too complex to have a separate set of rules for Switzerland. Along with Norway, they are the only country in the central / western european region not in the EU (I don't think I'm forgetting anyone).

I'm not sure it's in the Swiss' best interests to push for another custom agreement. There's a lot of talk about tightening the leash on banking in the EU lately.

But then nothing in this whole affair is in the Swiss' best interest. Even if they succeed in curtailing immigration, with unemployment being almost non-existent all they are going to manage is create a manpower shortage.

[DontSayBanana]

I don't know all the ins and outs of the treaties. I thought the common market was distinct from the migration stuff (which is about being in the EU) which is distinct from Schengen.

Here's the text of the "free movement of persons" agreement, for anyone that's interested: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:22002A0430(01):EN:HTML

[Zanza]

Alfred, what would you think if Texas would decide in a referendum that this: "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; [...] nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." would no longer apply to non-Texans and non-Texan US citizens would no longer have the right to seek work in Texas or move there?