The election of Simonetta Sommaruga is a historic moment. She becomes the fourth female in the seven-member Federal Council. Women only got to vote in Switzerland on a national level in 1971. Her election gives the cabinet a majority of women for the first time.
“Symbolically, it is a rather powerful message from a country with a conservative reputation to have four or five women out of the seven seats in the government,” said Pascal Sciarini, who heads the political science institute in the University of Geneva, to the AFP news agency.
Women in Switzerland have traditionally had a low-key role in public life, says the BBC’s Imogen Foulkes in Berne. They first got to vote at the local canton level in 1959, but not at the federal level until 1971. The last canton, Appenzell Innerrhoden, finally granted them voting rights in 1990.
Swiss women lag well behind men in average salaries, the Swiss state spends less than a third of UNICEF’s recommended minimum on childcare, and when it comes to maternity leave, Switzerland ranks as the least generous country in Europe.
Although it is highly unusual in Europe for women to hold a majority in a country’s cabinet, it is not unique. The Spanish cabinet unveiled by Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero after his re-election in 2008 included more women than men.
Finland, Norway and the Cape Verde Islands also have female majorities, according to the Inter Parliamentary Union.
Source: BBC, September 22, 2010 (Yesterday)
Eric Koch’s book, The Weimar Triangle, is available at Indigo-Chapters and in your local bookstore. 
