Swiss law on neutrality — Part I: a comprehensive systematic overview
Swiss law on neutrality — Part I: a comprehensive systematic overview With just a few weeks to go before the federal vote on 27 September 2026 on the popular initiative on neutrality, this study offers a systematic review of what Swiss law currently provides for in this area. The starting question is as simple as it is rarely asked: what are, at present, all the provisions — at constitutional, legislative, regulatory and international levels — that govern, directly or indirectly, the Confederation’s neutrality? The findings of the research are surprising in several respects. The Federal Constitution mentions neutrality in only two provisions (Articles 173 and 185), and does so not to define its content, but to assign responsibility for safeguarding it to the Federal Assembly and the Federal Council. The legislation most closely related to the subject — the Embargoes Act, the War Material Act and the Dual-Use Goods Control Act — never mentions neutrality, operating instead through general clauses requiring compliance with international law. This gives rise to the central issue of today’s debate: under current law, neutrality is a discretionary power, not a substantive principle with binding content. The silence of the Federal Supreme Court, which treats it as an act of government beyond judicial review, confirms this. It is precisely this framework that the initiative put to the vote seeks to amend, transforming a margin of political manoeuvre into a substantive constitutional constraint. The study also examines, as case studies, the 2022 sanctions against Russia and their relationship with the status of neutrality; the Bilateral Agreements III and the absence therein of any clause on neutrality; the revision of the War Material Act; and historical precedents in which Switzerland adopted a stricter form of neutrality (from the League of Nations to Rhodesia). This research constitutes the first of two volumes. The second, devoted to scenarios for how the situation might evolve should the initiative be accepted, will follow shortly as a sequel. This is a wide-ranging study that seeks to map out the multitude of aspects directly or indirectly influenced by neutrality, as a multifaceted mechanism of public international law. I have endeavoured to be as precise as possible and to thoroughly verify the sources on which this work is based. Should any errors or omissions come to light, I shall be happy to correct them or incorporate new elements in a subsequent edition.