Switzerland Today
Hello from Bern,
Where this week the Swiss army is providing a disproportionate quantity of stories for the media: from financial problems to Cold War-style motorway exercises (see photo), the forces are not flying under the radar. More on this after the main news of the day.
In the news: a mouthy fish, racism stats, culture award, and banking upheaval.
- A Zurich research team has revealed details, based on fossil analysis, of a 365-million-year-old fish with a huge underbite. The lower jaw of the fish – “Alienacanthus” – was twice as long as its skull, according to a study published yesterday in the Royal Society Open Science journal. Scientists say the long lower jaw was most likely used to capture live prey.
- According to a survey, one in six people living in Switzerland has been racially discriminated against in the past five years. Younger people and people with a migration background are particularly affected, the results show. Some 69% of those surveyed said they had been discriminated against in their everyday working life or when looking for a job.
- The prestigious Prix Meret Oppenheim 2024 has been jointly awarded to art mediator Jacqueline Burckhardt, architecture duo Marianne Burkhalter and Christian Sumi, and painter Valérie Favre. The prize, awarded annually by the Federal Office for Culture, honours lifetime achievements in the arts and comes with a booty of CHF40,000 ($46,427).
- Following heavy losses due to exposure to bankrupt property companies, the Swiss bank Julius Bär has parted ways with CEO Philipp Rickenbacher. The bank said that deputy CEO Nic Dreckmann would take over the top job until a permanent appointment could be made. In the meantime, it will take steps to wind down its remaining CHF800 million private debt business.
Solving football hooliganism: castration and ostracisation.
How can football vandals be reined in? Given the testosterone-fuelled nature of what they get up to, one group of comedians in England suggested in 1980External link the drastic if decisive measure of “cutting off their goolies” [“goolies” – male reproductive organs, editor]”. In Switzerland such a heavy-handed policy would, however, no doubt require a referendum. And so authorities are exploring more conventional – while also controversial – methods of cracking down.
The preferred choice in recent weeks has been simply to shut certain sectors of stadiums where violent fans usually sit, thus effectively barring them from attending games, Swiss public radio, SRF, reported yesterdayExternal link. This has been done in Bern, Lausanne, Lucerne, St Gallen and notably in Zurich – after recent clashes in the city centre between police and hooligans, who also wrecked a tram. “We no longer want to simply accept the violence,” said Karin Kayser-Frutschi from the Conference of Cantonal Police Directors, explaining the harsh measures.
But SRF says it’s unclear whether closing entire stadium sectors for games is an effective method. In the case of FC Zürich, 4,000 supporters were barred from a game this week due to efforts to clamp down on just 100 troublemakers. The club itself meanwhile says that the recent violence happened some 1.5km from the stadium, beyond the club’s “range of influence”. An expert cited by SRF also said that such collective punishment could backfire and generate a stronger feeling of solidarity among fans – and against the authorities.
Swiss defence forces: can’t stay out of the newspapers.
For a neutral country which hasn’t seen war since 1847, the Swiss talk a lot about their army. Yet even given the heightened debates since Russia invaded Ukraine two years ago, the past week has seen a disproportionately high number of stories.
First the army cancelled at short notice several big events due to take place this year and next, including the photogenic Axalp air-show (see picture). The reason? A rather banal cost-cutting drive. However, this suddenly sounded rather less banal when it emerged yesterday that the costs to be cut might run into the billions. According to an internal army document seen by media, the army has not stuck to pre-set budgetary plans in recent years, leading to over-ambitious spending which could lead to shortfalls of CHF1 billion by 2025.
Adding to these financial issues are problems with persuading young people to do their military service instead of trying to dodge it. As we reported in yesterday’s briefing, one recently revealed evasion manoeuvre involves dual French-Swiss citizens opting to fulfil a single day of military induction in France, which apparently manages to exempt them from the entire 245-day Swiss variant. Some 800 men have avoided Swiss military service this way over the past five years, Tamedia newspapers reported.
As if this all wasn’t enough, today’s newspapers also all run articles about the somewhat spectacular plans of the air force to take over part of the country’s longest motorway this summer: the government has approved the closure of a section of the A1 in June, so fighter jets can practise taking off and landing on it. The point of the exercises – which were carried out regularly during the Cold War – is to prepare for conflict, the air force chief Peter Merz said: “to be ready, should a war lead to the destruction or damaging of airport runways”.
The stats behind how social media changed the world.
Facebook is 20. The social media, which went live on February 4, 2004, has revolutionised (along with Instagram, WhatsApp, X, etc.) the way humanity communicates. And so, to celebrate this, today we published a statistical overview of the intense, interdependent, and sometimes conflictual relationship between Swiss people and social media networks: practically everybody uses them, most people are on them “several times a day”, and yet a majority reckons we should try harder to communicate directly with each other, and keep children away from social media as long as possible. Find more stats and have your say on all this in “Dialogue”.
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