Switzerland votes to curb EU immigration

[DontSayBanana]

Not really. Cutting Switzerland off from the common market could seriously harm the country. Why do that when by the narrowest of margins all Swiss voters have done is said they want some limit, in 3 years? With business and the government aligned in not wanting any limits, it seems that any limit will be very minor.

Because access to the common market was a perk of signing onto Schengen and not a basic right?  Because signatories to treaties are obliged to respect the treaty or lose access to services provided as an effect of that treaty?

Do you usually advocate letting states cherry pick enforcement of treaties based on what they do and don't like?

[Iormlund]

Why does the harm to the Swiss economy matter to the EU? They chose this path.

We can talk about a new set of treaties if they want, but obviously they are not going to to start in a very good negotiating position, since they are obligated to drop out of the single market if no agreement is reached.

[garbon]

But AR you seem to be arguing then for a paper tiger version of the EU.

Not really. Cutting Switzerland off from the common market could seriously harm the country. Why do that when by the narrowest of margins all Swiss voters have done is said they want some limit, in 3 years? With business and the government aligned in not wanting any limits, it seems that any limit will be very minor.

I don't know that it has to been enacted, but it should certainly be wielded as an omnipresent (and real) threat to convince other concessions from the Swiss in lieu of laxity over this issue.

[Zanza]

Switzerland is party to Schengen, and thus the four freedoms.

Schengen and the four freedoms are different things. Ireland + UK are not part of Schengen, but they have the four freedoms.

[Zanza]

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.

[Zanza]

Not really. Cutting Switzerland off from the common market could seriously harm the country. Why do that when by the narrowest of margins all Swiss voters have done is said they want some limit, in 3 years? With business and the government aligned in not wanting any limits, it seems that any limit will be very minor.

The EU will not cancel the treaty but will expect Switzerland to adhere to it. However, the Swiss government must cancel the treaty now according to their constitutional amendment, so the ball is really in their field. They need to approach the EU to negotiate a new deal, the EU just wants to keep the status quo.

[Iormlund]

Switzerland is party to Schengen, and thus the four freedoms.

Schengen and the four freedoms are different things. Ireland + UK are not part of Schengen, but they have the four freedoms.

You're right, though I don't see how the former makes sense without the latter.

[Capetan Mihali]

This is one of those situations that brings home for me the shortcomings of simple-majority democracy.  Obviously, you have to deal with the fact that the YES achieved the necessary 50%.  But if 49.7%  of the voting population said NO, it seems strange to refer to the attitudes of "Switzerland" in this regard, even though it is binding politically.  And even though the French and German-speaking cantons split pretty cleanly between each other on the vote, there was a sizable group voting the other way within each canton.

It kind of reminds of me of the 2004 election, and its fallout to the present, where we had/have the Red State-Blue State reductive analysis, even though pretty large sections of each state voted the other way.  So you get state names as metonymy, "Massachusetts" standing in for democratic socialism and "Texas" standing in for evangelical reaction -- and of course the all-important "Ohio," whose symbolic meaning could still be fixed to one pole or another through the strenuous efforts of Guardian letter-writers -- even though there were plenty of people voting for the opposite political party in each state.  (Though, obviously, the French-/German-speaking divide in Switzerland is much older and more profound.)

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...

[garbon]

It kind of reminds of me of the 2004 election, and its fallout to the present, where we had/have the Red State-Blue State reductive analysis, even though pretty large sections of each state voted the other way.  So you get state names as metonymy, "Massachusetts" standing in for democratic socialism and "Texas" standing in for evangelical reaction -- and of course the all-important "Ohio," whose symbolic meaning could still be fixed to one pole or another through the strenuous efforts of Guardian letter-writers -- even though there were plenty of people voting for the opposite political party in each state.  (Though, obviously, the French-/German-speaking divide in Switzerland is much older and more profound.)

Sure but doesn't that also come as a result of the majority being larger than just 51%? If a state is consistently voting 60/40 against, kind of makes sense to view through that simplistic lens.

[Syt]

This is one of those situations that brings home for me the shortcomings of simple-majority democracy.  Obviously, you have to deal with the fact that the YES achieved the necessary 50%.  But if 49.7%  of the voting population said NO,

Btw, participation in the vote was around 50%. So about half of the people of Switzerland didn't care enough to voice their opinion, and the remainder duked it out.

Personally, I'm not against direct democracy, but it would need a few safeguards.

For one, I think you need a significant part of the populace voting, say 60 or 70%. Otherwise it stands to reason that a significant part of the populace is indifferent, in which case I would want to leave it with elected representatives. Secondly, I would suggest requiring at least a 60-40 split to make sure that the result represents a clear majority of the people who turned out to vote.

Finally, there would need to be mechanisms to protect rights of ethnic/religious/sexual/whatever minorities.

[Capetan Mihali]

Sure but doesn't that also come as a result of the majority being larger than just 51%? If a state is consistently voting 60/40 against, kind of makes sense to view through that simplistic lens.

I don't know, for me that's just not a big enough majority to really say "State X 'feels' this way about this issue," though of course it's convenient shorthand.  Clearly more people (voting) do than don't, but with 4 disagreeing for every 6 agreeing , I'd say the issue is still contested.  Within the state, that is: I do think that at the municipality level you are (increasingly?) getting pretty clear divisions on political affiliation and most major issues.

[Capetan Mihali]

This is one of those situations that brings home for me the shortcomings of simple-majority democracy.  Obviously, you have to deal with the fact that the YES achieved the necessary 50%.  But if 49.7%  of the voting population said NO,

Btw, participation in the vote was around 50%. So about half of the people of Switzerland didn't care enough to voice their opinion, and the remainder duked it out.

I'm kind of surprised it's so low, given the turnout.  I speculate that the supporters of ballot initiatives tend to be the ones most enthused to actually vote on them.  And it seems like a message that more than 25% of Swiss could get enthused about...

[Syt]

This is one of those situations that brings home for me the shortcomings of simple-majority democracy.  Obviously, you have to deal with the fact that the YES achieved the necessary 50%.  But if 49.7%  of the voting population said NO,

Btw, participation in the vote was around 50%.

Wikipedia says 55% turnout, and that 40% is a typical turnout, so participation was actually comparatively high. 

The Swiss also voted to keep abortions covered by medical insurance.

[Capetan Mihali]

Damn, 40%?  In free little Helvetica? That is USA-level political apathy.

[Zanza]

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