Mr. Bochsler, has the magic formula served its time?

The Libe­rals, the FDP has two seats in the Federal Coun­cil, but has been con­sist­ent­ly losing voter shares and seats in par­lia­ment for a long time. After its recent los­ses, is the FDP still enti­t­led to two seats in the natio­nal government at all? Dani­el Bochs­ler has cal­cu­la­ted all pos­si­ble magic for­mu­las and asses­ses the situation.

After the elec­tions to the Coun­cil of Sta­tes, the Alli­an­ce of the Cent­re par­ty group is likely to be lar­ger than that of the FDP. Will the FDP have to give up one of its two Federal Coun­cil seats?

Dani­el Bochs­ler: I am curious about the second rounds of voting. Howe­ver, the­re is no auto­ma­tism in the magic for­mu­la. And it is even less clear what the magic for­mu­la is based on in the first place: the elec­to­ral strengths, or the com­po­si­ti­on of the Federal Assem­bly. In recent years, some par­ties have also inter­pre­ted new, crea­ti­ve ele­ments into it. For examp­le, that the cabi­net com­po­si­ti­on at the federal level should be deri­ved from that of can­to­nal governments, or that it should be cal­cu­la­ted on the basis of ima­gi­na­ry blocks in par­lia­ment. The for­mer may well make sen­se, but seems to be a prag­ma­tic ben­ding of the for­mu­la to jus­ti­fy seat claims. The lat­ter would allow for fle­xi­ble list com­bi­na­ti­ons depen­ding on the situa­ti­on; they open the door to stra­te­gic games and deals.

If the FDP has to give up a seat, who should get it?

The FDP does not have to give up any seats at the moment. I don’t see any inte­rest in this from the right-wing camp, and the Cent­re pre­si­dent says into every micro­pho­ne held out to him that he will not vote out any incum­bent federal coun­cil­lors. This means that the­re is no majo­ri­ty for the remo­val of incum­bent FDP man­da­te hol­ders, per­for­mance record or not.

If the­re were an FDP vacan­cy, the Greens would pro­bab­ly be brought into play. By most cal­cu­la­ti­ons, they are more than half as strong as the FDP, and thus the­re is no ques­ti­on that the FDP can hard­ly jus­ti­fy a dou­ble repre­sen­ta­ti­on as long as the Greens are not repre­sen­ted. Bal­tha­sar Glätt­li, pre­si­dent of the Green Par­ty, likes to refer to the rele­vant cal­cu­la­ti­on. He could refe­rence the Sain­te-Laguë elec­to­ral for­mu­la. It is not unknown in Switz­er­land; the can­ton of Basel-Stadt uses it to elect its can­to­nal par­lia­ment, and it under­lies the dou­ble pro­por­tio­nal repre­sen­ta­ti­on that is used in a gro­wing num­ber of can­tons. Glätt­li’s argu­ment would be that it reflects the elec­to­ral votes or Natio­nal Coun­cil seats as clo­se­ly as possible.

In terms of voter shares, the SVP would be twice as big as the FDP, and thus clo­ser to a third seat than the FDP is to the second. The SVP likes to insist on the arith­me­ti­cal argu­ment, but I have yet to hear the SVP call for a three-mem­ber repre­sen­ta­ti­on. Eit­her becau­se it would look dif­fe­rent depen­ding on the com­po­si­ti­on of the Coun­cil of Sta­tes and the under­ly­ing arith­me­tic, or becau­se depen­ding on the pro­por­tio­nal repre­sen­ta­ti­on for­mu­la used, i.e. if one were to cal­cu­la­te accord­ing to Sain­te-Laguë rather than Natio­nal Coun­cil pro­por­tio­nal repre­sen­ta­ti­on, the SVP would have to give arith­me­tic pre­ce­dence to the Greens. But more likely becau­se a third SVP seat would have no poli­ti­cal chan­ce any­way, and would pro­bab­ly be con­si­de­red arro­gant by the popu­la­ti­on. Moreo­ver, the SVP does not want to bear too much government respon­si­bi­li­ty any­way, but as the only par­ty in government with three repre­sen­ta­ti­ves it should.

A Cent­re claim would only result accord­ing to the last of the ran­king for­mu­la 2–2‑2–1, with which the FDP has pedd­led in recent years. But I only see pseu­do-argu­ments for this for­mu­la. If I unders­tood it cor­rect­ly, as it as never been clear, no par­ty should be more repre­sen­ted in the Federal Coun­cil than the others, and fewer than four par­ties would be too few, more than four par­ties would be too many.

Of cour­se, the 2–2‑2–1 for­mu­la would beco­me unten­ab­le if the­re were a par­ty with an abso­lu­te par­lia­men­ta­ry majo­ri­ty, becau­se this par­ty would of cour­se have to pro­vi­de at least four mem­bers of the Federal Coun­cil. Or if the fourth par­ty were to fall into a low sin­gle-digit per­cen­ta­ge. We will pro­bab­ly not see eit­her of the­se cases in the next few deca­des, but the­se hypo­the­ti­cal examp­les show that a fixed ran­king for­mu­la has not­hing to do with sup­po­sed pro­por­tio­na­li­ty.

Of cour­se, the Federal Coun­cil is not put tog­e­ther with a cal­cu­la­tor, rather poli­ti­cal­ly, and the Cent­re has an advan­ta­ge in the par­ty-poli­ti­cal struc­tu­re if it wants to dis­pu­te the second seat with the FDP, at best in a kind of alli­an­ce of con­ve­ni­en­ce with the Green Libe­ral Par­ty and an agree­ment that the seat should rota­te. They pro­bab­ly have the medi­an par­lia­men­ta­ri­an, i.e. neit­her to the right nor to the left of it can a majo­ri­ty be achie­ved without the Cent­re, and thus a lot of power.

Is the­re even a cal­cu­la­ti­on for­mu­la for the com­po­si­ti­on of the Federal Council?

None of the­se cal­cu­la­ti­ons are reco­gnis­ed in any way. Unli­ke in Nort­hern Ire­land, for examp­le, whe­re the­re is a sta­tu­to­ry pro­por­tio­nal for­mu­la not only for the dis­tri­bu­ti­on of seats in the exe­cu­ti­ve, but also for the dis­tri­bu­ti­on of minis­tries. Based on the num­ber of seats in the regio­nal par­lia­ment, an order is estab­lis­hed accord­ing to which the par­ties can select minis­tries. This has the advan­ta­ge that they do not even have to talk to each other to form the government. None of this holds true in Switz­er­land. In 1959, the SP, under the lea­ders­hip of the then Con­ser­va­ti­ve-Chris­ti­an-Social Peo­p­le’s Par­ty, the pre­de­ces­sor par­ty of today­’s Cent­re, won a second Federal Coun­cil seat, and various inter­pre­ta­ti­ons were then deri­ved from this, but this is all ad hoc nume­ri­cal magic. It’s more about poli­ti­cal con­si­de­ra­ti­ons. And often about the fact that the­re is litt­le sup­port for the cur­rent for­mu­la, but that the­re is no majo­ri­ty for a change.

Why is it not pos­si­ble to deri­ve a direct seat claim on the basis of voter shares?

That could be done, but that would be the sys­tem of a direct popu­lar elec­tion by pro­por­tio­nal repre­sen­ta­ti­on, or an indi­rect mecha­nism for­mu­la­ted in such a way as to be equi­va­lent to one. You don’t have to look far for an examp­le of this, just look at Ticino.

In Switz­er­land, Federal Coun­cil­lors are re-elec­ted in the vast majo­ri­ty of cases. When would be the right time for a pos­si­ble chan­ge in the par­ty-poli­ti­cal com­po­si­ti­on of the Federal Council?

If re-elec­tion is con­si­de­red sacro­sanct, the com­po­si­ti­on can only chan­ge in the event of death or vol­un­ta­ry resi­gna­ti­on of a repre­sen­ta­ti­ve of the respec­ti­ve par­ty. This also gives the par­ty and its Federal Coun­cil mem­bers a stra­te­gic tool. As a result, mem­bers of the government who are tired of office may feel under pres­su­re to stay in office lon­ger than they would like, others may feel pres­su­red to resign ear­ly. This could be reme­di­ed by deli­ber­ate­ly voting them out of office, be it becau­se of unsa­tis­fac­to­ry per­for­mance, chan­ging poli­ti­cal alli­an­ces or elec­to­ral shifts. But majo­ri­ties in the Federal Assem­bly are very sel­dom found for such things. Perhaps this has some­thing to do with the elec­tion pro­ce­du­re, i.e. the sin­gle elec­tion. I dare not judge whe­ther this unwrit­ten princip­le of re-elec­ting all mem­bers of government offers more advan­ta­ges or disadvantages.

Pho­to: wiki­me­dia commons