Twenty Years of European Greens
1984 - 2004
edited by Arnold Cassola & Per Gahrton
Hans Beat Schaffner
Die Grünen/Les Verts (Switzerland)
- Coordination Secretariat Member 1991 - 1992
After the first Green Parties in French speaking Switzerland were successful in the cantonal elections of Neuchâtel and Vaud, Greens were elected in municipal and cantonal elections even in the German speaking part. The first Swiss Green group elected in the canton of Berne at the end of the seventies was the Demokratische Alternative, founded in 1976. In August 1978 the Green Party in the canton of Zurich was founded and participated for the first time in the cantonal and national elections in 1979. In the municipal elections of 1982 the first Greens were elected to city councils and parliaments in the canton of Zurich, followed in April 1983 by the first four cantonal MPs.
After this success Daniel Brélaz contacted us in view of the national elections in October 1983 in order to found a Swiss Green Party, as one had to be present in at least five cantons to qualify as a national party and in order to participate in the electoral debates of the media. Consequently, Bernhard Pulver and Luzius Theiler of the Demokratische Alternative Berne called together all the existing green and alternative cantonal movements. In several sessions we debated for hours on a common programme and statutes. But as the differences between the dogmatic leftist groups and the ecological movements from French speaking Switzerland and Zurich were too big, the Green parties from Neuchâtel, Vaud, Geneva, Zurich and Northwest Switzerland in May 1983 decided to proceed and founded the Federation of the Green Parties of Switzerland in Fribourg. This, in short, became known as the Green Party of Switzerland and later also as Grüne/Les Verts.
In the national elections of October 1983 Daniel Brélaz was re-elected and Laurent Rebeaud (Geneva) and Arnold Müller (Zurich) were elected for the first time. Leni Robert, who had left the radical party in Berne and organised a free list for the elections, was also elected and joined the Green Group. Later her group also joined the Swiss Green Party as a cantonal party. The candidates from the leftist groups, who had also formed a coalition for the elections, did not succeed. Only the Progressive Organisations (POCH), that had not participated in the debates, as they were already organised at the national level, gained some seats.
In January 1984 Daniel Brélaz and I for the first time attended a meeting of the European Green Coordination in Brussels and the Swiss Green Party was admitted as an observer party. It took until March 1987 to be accepted as a full member, as some delegates to the Coordination, especially from the German Greens, thought that the POCH was the real Green Party in Switzerland. In the meantime some of the POCH cantonal parties had become Green Alternative Parties and joined our Green Federation. Later on the POCH dissolved and their remaining political exponents either joined the Greens or the Socialdemocrat Party.
Therefore, it may be regarded as symbolic that Luzius Theiler and I were among the founding members of the European Federation of Green Parties in 1993 in Finland.
