Switzerland Today
Dear Swiss Abroad,
The chances are high that if you’re reading this newsletter, then your major language, or one of your major languages, is English. In Switzerland, English is spreading too, especially in the business world. What does this mean for national linguistic cohesion? This question and more in Friday’s briefing.
In the news: pioneer of women’s politics in Switzerland dies aged 86
- Elisabeth Kopp, the first woman to serve as a Swiss cabinet minister, died on Good Friday, it was confirmed today. The politician from the centre-right Radical-Liberal party entered government in 1984. In 1989 she was forced to resign after a political scandal involving the sharing of confidential information.
- Swiss media published details today of a letter by G7 countries raising concerns about Swiss “loopholes” in the implementation of Russian sanctions. The letter questions Swiss privacy provisions, as well as criticising the amount of Russian assets (CHF7.5 billion) frozen by Bern to date. Switzerland has rejected the claims.
- While Switzerland largely met its goals to cut down on gas usage in winter 2022-2023, calls to save electricity were less well heeded. From October 2022 to March 2023, gas usage fell by slightly more than the goal of 15%, RTS public television said on Thursday. However, electricity use only dropped by 4%, compared to the 10% goal.
English: de facto Swiss national tongue or mere “nice to have”?
For a language which is the main daily tongue of 1.4% of the Swiss population, English is doing well for itself. For example: announcing the last-ditch rescue of Credit Suisse a few weeks ago, Finance Minister Karin Keller Sutter and Swiss President Alain Berset took the unprecedented step of making their statements not just in the national languages but also in English – almost unheard of at a domestic Swiss political press conference.
Granted, that was an exceptional event, followed closely around the world. But even within Swiss workplaces, English has by now replaced French as the second-most spoken language after German, the (French-language) newspaper Le Temps writes todayExternal link, citing the Adecco Group’s Swiss Job Market Index. English skills also pay off: having English plus a local Swiss language boosts your salary by 17.9% on average; having English plus two Swiss languages boosts it by 20%.
But just because it’s everywhere, it doesn’t mean everyone speaks it well. In a separate editorial, Le Temps worries that Switzerland slipped 10 places to 29th in the 2022 English Proficiency Index; “we” might even be at risk of being overtaken by – gasp! – France, it writesExternal link. Why is this the case? Le Temps criticises a lack of imagination regarding study trips abroad and innovation in education, as well as the fact that “the teaching of the national languages overshadows English”.
So should English be given more priority in schools, to the possible detriment of French, Italian and German? The (German-speaking) NZZ reckons not: earlier this week it complainedExternal link about big Swiss-based firms like Lonza, Roche or Swiss Re, which require staff to know English but don’t require them to learn any national language. This can be “irritating” for many locals, who are forced to use their pidgin English to accommodate clueless expats, the paper wrote.
Ultimately, for the NZZ, the national languages remain the priority for Switzerland, with English remaining a “nice to have” – regardless of the obvious advantages of speaking Shakespeare’s tongue in a globalised world.
Taking off: the last hurrah for a supersonic oldie
The last ever European flight by a Mirage III fighter jet is to take place in Switzerland on May 25, the NZZ newspaper reported today. After a final flight around Payerne in the west of the country, the iconic fighter is to go into retirement slightly ahead of schedule – because there’s simply no longer any European-based firm capable of maintaining the old aircraft, currently operated by a private company.
Until last year, the jet took off around 24 times per year, and charged enthusiasts a tidy CHF15,000 ($16,822) to get onboard. The origins of the plane go back to the 1960s, when Switzerland forked out over a billion francs to buy the Mirages for its air force: over time, it purchased 61 of them, of which 10 were lost to crashes. The plane made up the backbone of the air force until the turn of the century, when it was replaced by the F/A-18 Hornets and F-5 Tigers.
Taking off II: JUICE and Icy Moons in the heavens
After the postponement of its launch yesterday due to risk of lightning, the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) successfully began its eight-year journey to Jupiter today, blasting off from French Guiana. The probe aims to then orbit the giant gas planet as well as Jupiter’s three icy moons for three years to search for, among other things, traces of life. The University of Bern contributed to the development of several key instruments on board the mission – find out more here.
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