• Go to Roger B's profile

    Can't agree

    posted by  Roger B in Switzerland forum 

    Hi basanta,

    Let's not stereotype here. I think attributing or extrapolating any of the Swiss behaviour to other Europeans might not work. What I especially don't like though, is saying that it is the result of some "superiority complex", I can't help it, but that is just plain wrong and frought with many wrong assumptions (what's that about secrecy to maintain anyway? If that's an allusion to our banks, well let me just say that the Swiss economy has much more to offer than just that, and that we do not all work at or subjugate our life to the workings of the Paradeplatz).

    And once again I want to re-itaret that in the Swiss case (I don't comment the others, as I do not know their cases to well and as said before, I do not like such generalizations), it's not geared against foreigners but a phenomenon that occurs among Swiss as well. What you call close minded is just a very cautious and slow approach. That the Swiss have a high esteem for privacy and a "hands-off-approach" to others might also be a reason why many celebrities come to live here (at least that's what they say, although I believe paying only a fraction of taxes might help big-time as well ;-). Why we are so reserved probably is more rooted in our history as a small, poor (yeah, once upon a time Switzerland was really the poor house of Europe), most of the time different and over large periods of time threatened country, than out of any sense of superiority.

    The argument that we like to live in our "own groups" is betrayed by the fact that a large proportion of the general population is either foreign born or second generation (it's roughly between 20 and 25% in a country of 7.5 million), with many having perfectly blended in and added to the Swiss society (for instance the significant population with Italian, Portuguese or Spanish roots, to stay somewhat closer to home, or the not insignificant Lanka-Tamil population - even the somewhat bad-publicity prone Balkan population is ever more integrated). If we had a superiority complex and liked to stay in "our group", why would we naturalize these people and have our society "spoiled" by them? Truth of the matter is that Switzerland, through its political system and its location in the middle of Western Europe has attracted foreigners ever since the economic and political circumstances allowed for such movements (I would say probably in and around the early 17th century).

    Furthermore, as already written before, I think the term "own group" is highly problematic as it assigns people to have only one single identity. To keep with Amartya Sen and his book "Identity and Violence", we are however shifting these depending on context and topics. Granted, there are currently "sons of the soil" sentiments on the rise in Switzerland (there were always such sentiments, as in many other parts of the world - be it Arizona or Maharashtra- but over the last few years they've taken up some speed which might be the result of globalization and the above invoked significant percentage of foreign residents), that want to define what it means to be "Swiss". However, liberals as me, try our best to keep our resistance against such gross and unhelpful categorizations (sometimes I feel that in the eyes of the people's party one is only Swiss if one goes to the "Älplerfest", likes "Fahnenschwingen" and "Alphorn" ).

    Such, surging and abating waves of xenophobia notwithstanding, I think Switzerland is still a country where the software of people counts more than their hardware. I have friends with Cambodian, Italian, Spanish, Turkish and Indian roots, all accepted and integrated without having to assimilate blindly into Swiss culture. I myself am the product of past immigration, as are many fellow Swiss.

    So no, definetly, I don't think people in Switzerland are the way the are because of any superiority complexes or an urge to stay within the group. There might be those that are the way you describe them, but I think one can find such close-minded groups in every society and nation on this planet if one looks close enough (be it the "Swiss Democrats", the modern day "Minutemen" or the Maharashtra "Shiv Sena" ).

Post a reply

Other replies