Switzerland Today
Dear Swiss Abroad,
Can you still remember your school essays? Probably written by hand, without spellcheck. I dare say that very few of them were masterpieces – let alone published later.
Max Frisch, of course, was a different story. His Matura essay has now been published for the first time. As a small consolation for the rest of us: even Frisch did not always impress his German teacher. The essay received a 4.5 (out of 6).
Good reading!
Yesterday, Iran and the US concluded their third round of nuclear negotiations in Geneva. Although no breakthrough was achieved, several participants expressed cautious optimism.
Oman’s Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi, who is mediating between the two countries, spoke of “significant progress” after the talks. Technical-level discussions are planned for next week in Vienna, where US and Iranian delegations are expected to clarify practical issues at the International Atomic Energy Agency. If these take place, details of a possible agreement could then be negotiated.
Swiss public television, SRF, correspondent Sebastian Ramspeck noted: “Almost nothing of the talks has leaked out. But that tends to be a good sign in diplomacy.” Forces on both the American and Iranian sides remain sceptical or even hostile to the negotiations and may have an interest in their failure.
It remains unclear whether further rounds will follow. Both sides continue to exert pressure and issue threats, but “both sides clearly still have the goal of finding a diplomatic solution,” Ramspeck said.
Just over 100 days into his term, the head of the Federal Intelligence Service (FIS), Serge Bavaud, has taken stock – and warned of possible attacks on the G7 summit on Lake Geneva in June.
Bavaud, previously a crisis manager at the foreign ministry, took over an intelligence service facing internal tensions and staff departures. One of the main causes was a far-reaching reform introduced by his predecessor. After discussions with employees and partner organisations, Bavaud concluded that the reform was necessary but implemented too quickly.
He aims to complete the FIS transformation by the end of 2026. In addition to internal adjustments, he says additional resources are required. In his view, the service will need more than 100 extra posts, partly due to developments in artificial intelligence.
With regard to the upcoming G7 summit this summer, Bavaud sees left-wing and right-wing violent extremism, as well as terrorism, as the main threats, closely linked to the international situation. According to the CH Media newspapers, a national information network and coordination with the affected cantons and international partners are intended to ensure that authorities can anticipate developments and act in advance.
Two prominent members of the left-wing Social Democratic Party are leaving the House of Representatives. Eric Nussbaumer from canton Basel will step down at the end of April, while Pierre-Alain Fridez will leave office after the spring session.
Nussbaumer, who has served in the House of Representatives for more than 18 years, made his mark primarily as a pro-European voice. The planned signing of the Bilateral Agreements III by the government marks a “historic milestone”, he told the Swiss News Agency Keystone-SDA. “So it’s the perfect moment to step down.” He will be succeeded by Miriam Locher from canton Basel.
His party colleague Pierre-Alain Fridez, who has represented canton Jura since 2011 and is known for his focus on security policy, will step down at the end of the spring session. Fridez wants to give his successor, Loïc Dobler, time to establish himself, Swiss public broadcaster RTS reports. The resignation was not entirely unexpected: Fridez had already considered leaving during the previous parliamentary elections but remained at the request of his party to secure the seat.
A column by former Social Democratic Party president Peter Bodenmann in Weltwoche also generated attention. The 73-year-old accuses the party’s new generation of getting lost in moral debates instead of pursuing strategic success. He described them as “Rosarote Barbershop-Linke” (pink barbershop lefties – an expression Bodenmann appears to have invented) and accuses the co-chairs Mattea Meyer and Cédric Wermuth of having “no clue”. Bodenmann did not spare other Social Democrat figureheads such as parliamentarian from canton Zurich Fabian Molina or parliamentarian from Lucerne David Roth.
In his Matura essay from 1930, Swiss playwright and novelist Max Frisch – then a highschool student – reflected on the “light and dark sides of modern technology”. The handwritten essay has now been published for the first time.
For Thomas Strässle, president of the Max Frisch Foundation, the publication is “a small literary-historical sensation”. It is not only the oldest surviving handwritten manuscript by Frisch, but it dates from a period in which he destroyed almost everything he had written.
The theme appears to have been assigned. Frisch’s response was polemical. Technology, “identified with culture by thoroughbred idiots”, may give us time, he wrote, but modern man knows nothing better to do with it than “think about all the devil’s stuff”. And: “The more clearly and logically we think, the more quickly we recognise the bottomless dullness of our existence.”
Strässle sees early traits of the later writer in the student’s language: nothing superfluous, “everything reduced to the maximum”. That clarity was already evident in the school essay.
The essay’s publication is also linked to a theft. A later pupil at Frisch’s school in Zurich removed the manuscript from an archive cupboard in the 1950s, when Frisch was already an established writer. He said he wanted to preserve it for posterity, writing in 2024 when he sent it to the Max Frisch Archive.
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