| Review of: | Swiss foreign policy, 1945-2002 edited by Jürg Martin Gabriel, Thomas Fischer |
|---|---|
| Reviewed By: | Victor Mauer |
| Reviewed in: | International Affairs |
| Date accepted online: | 27/07/2004 |
| Published in print: | Volume 80, Issue 2, Pages 367-414 |
Europe
This collection of articles is the first of its kind in English. It provides a remarkably coherent and competent, indeed an authoritative survey of past and contemporary Swiss foreign policy and gives due emphasis to its multilateral dimensions, both domestic and foreign. Each of the eight contributions, written by a mix of well-established and young Swiss scholars, is carefully researched, thought-provoking and thoroughly readable.
Of the eight articles, three focus on subject matters that have traditionally been associated with Swiss foreign policy, such as human rights and the provision of good offices for conflict resolution, or, as in the case of the International Committee of the Red Cross, have been closely tied to the history of Switzerland. Taken together, the various contributions provide valuable insights into the diversity of Swiss foreign policy, including security issues, arms control and foreign trade.
Jürg Martin Gabriel's introductory analysis of Swiss foreign policy in a changing world serves as a reference point for the other contributions. He traces the origins, development and changing nature of what he perceptively terms as Swiss 'political uniqueness', i.e. the conviction of the Swiss that their domestic and foreign politics are markedly different from those of other countries and their consideration of sovereignty and neutrality as ends in themselves rather than as instruments of foreign policy. He concludes that although some progress has been made in bringing Swiss foreign policy in line with that of similar European states, the 'really big hurdles are still ahead' (p. 2).
Andreas Wenger, in his article on Swiss security policy, demonstrates how Switzerland has gradually expanded its security policy commitment in Europe, albeit within the strict confines of domestic public opinion. In his conclusion, he suggests that though the concept of armed neutrality is undergoing transformation and that Switzerland is able to make specific, targeted contributions abroad, the country 'still has no means to influence European and international security policy' (p. 40).
Other contributors provide a critical assessment of elements of Swiss foreign policy during the Cold War. While they acknowledge and, indeed, give credit to greater flexibility and realism in the government's foreign policy since the 1993 Foreign Policy Report, they dispel certain widely held myths. For instance, they demonstrate that for decades, human rights played virtually no role in Swiss foreign policy and that the promotion of human rights has become important only in recent years (Jon Fanzun); that the concept of good offices suffered from rhetorical overstretch (Thomas Fischer) and that the 'process of giving neutrality a quasi-absolute quality and raising it to the central issue of any public foreign policy discourse turned out to be as counter-productive as the constant embracing of the notion of uniqueness and the related idea of a special Swiss role outside the UN' (Daniel Möckli, p. 57).
The editors, in their preface, rightly identify the growing dynamism of the European Union as the main challenge to Swiss foreign policy at the beginning of the twenty-first century. It is, therefore, all the more regrettable that there is no separate article dealing with Switzerland's multifaceted relationship with the EU. However, this does not detract from the astute, and often provocative, observations of the contributors on past and contemporary aspects of Swiss foreign policy. As such, this collection of articles not only provides the essential background, but also serves to clarify many of the complexities of Swiss foreign policy, which have frequently been overlooked in the international scholarly debate.