International treaties or national law – what takes precedence? In Switzerland, a people’s initiative wants to decide this once and for all, but is coming up against strong resistance in parliament and civil society. Switzerland has signed over 5,000 international treaties with other states. But those behind the people’s initiative “Swiss law instead of foreign judges” want to ensure that in the future Swiss law takes precedence over the international. Launched by the conservative-right Swiss People’s Party, the initiative proposes that the federal constitution should take precedence over international law, and that the country cannot take on international obligations that run against it. If this was to be the case, it says, Switzerland would have to either modify or leave the international treaty in question. “Here, it’s us that decide”, the initiators say. Whatever the Swiss electorate chooses should be applied – regardless of what has been agreed with other countries or ...
