Anti-Corruption and Integrity Outlook 2024 – Country Notes: Switzerland

Contextual factors

 

State structure	Executive power	Legislative system	Legal system
Federal	Parliamentary	Bicameral	Civil law

Strategy and institutions on anti-corruption and public integrity

The Federal Council of Switzerland has adopted an Anti-Corruption Strategy for 2021-2024, structured around the three pillars “prevention”, “detection and law enforcement”, and “international cooperation”. The Strategy consists of 11 goals, covering awareness-raising, risk-based approach, transparency, detection and investigation, private sector, and international cooperation with 42 measures primarily directed at the Federal Administration. The Interdepartmental Working Group (IDWG) on Combating Corruption coordinates the anti-corruption activities of federal government offices and agencies at various levels and maintains a regular dialogue with the 26 cantons’ governments, the private sector, civil society and academia.

Several institutions have a mandate to mitigate public integrity risks in their corresponding fields. The Swiss Federal Audit Office oversees the financing of political parties and election campaigns, as well as harmonising internal audit systems. The Federal Financial Administration instead develops internal control across the public sector. The Federal Act on Freedom of Information in the Administration regulates access to information, and delegates the duty to provide information at the request of individuals or authorities to the Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner. The Commissioner has a supervisory role and can issue recommendations but cannot issue binding decisions. Additionally, the Open Government Data Office under the Federal Statistical Office is responsible for the implementation of the “Open Government Data’’ strategy. There are no central bodies responsible for mitigating public integrity risks in lobbying and in conflict-of-interest procedures.

Overview

 

Greatest strengths	Areas to improve
Transparency of public information	Anti-corruption strategy - implementation
Political finance	Lobbying
Conflict of interest - regulation	Conflict of interest - implementation

Anti-corruption strategy

Measured against OECD standards on the quality and effectiveness of the anti-corruption strategic framework, Switzerland fulfils 53% of criteria on regulation and 17% on implementation, compared to the OECD average of 45% and 36%, respectively.

Switzerland's Anti-Corruption Strategy 2021-2024 establishes first-level strategic objectives to mitigate public integrity risks in human resource management, internal control and risk management, fraud and other types of corruption across the public sector, and in public-private partnerships. Although the strategy was developed using a wide range of evidence and identifies existing public integrity risks and, it does not include outcome-level indicators for all public integrity objectives and does not have an action plan. The Interdepartmental Working Group (IDWG) on Combatting Corruption is responsible for monitoring the implementation of the strategy, and is expected to publish a monitoring report in the first semester of 2024.

Corruption risk management and audit

As measured against OECD standards on risk management, which include internal control and internal audit, Switzerland fulfils 68% of criteria on regulation and 51% of criteria on implementation, compared to the OECD average of 67% and 33%, respectively.

The regulatory framework defines internal control and internal audit according to international standards, defines managerial responsibility regarding the implementation of internal control and internal audit, specifies internal control objectives, establishes annual internal control and internal audit reporting activities, and regulations for implementing internal control are applicable to all public organisations across the federal administration (central government), including social security funds. Regulations also ensure that internal audit functions have unrestricted access to political staff and senior managers. Switzerland’s risk management framework fulfils all five criteria on regulations. Although Switzerland does not have a central harmonisation unit responsible for developing the internal control and internal audit systems, the Federal Finance Administration is responsible for internal control, and the Swiss Federal Audit Office (SFAO) is responsible for internal audit.

Based on available data, Switzerland performs strongly on implementation. For example, roles and responsibilities for managing integrity risks have been assigned in all federal budget organisations. Evidence on internal audit recommendations are not centralised due to the federal state structure.

Lobbying

As measured against OECD standards on lobbying, on average, OECD countries fulfil 38% of criteria on regulations and 35% on practice. However, Switzerland does not fulfil any criteria on regulations and practice to mitigate corruption risks related to lobbying.

A regulatory framework that establishes clear definitions for lobbying can help to ensure that lobbying enhances rather than inhibits effective policymaking. Additional disclosure requirements such as a lobbying register increase transparency, thus enabling public awareness of the actors influencing policy.

Conflict of interest

As measured against OECD standards on conflict of interest, Switzerland fulfils 33% of criteria on regulation and does not fulfil any criteria on implementation, compared to the OECD average of 76% and 40%, respectively.

The regulatory framework defines circumstances and relationships that can lead to conflict-of-interest situations for public officials, establish the obligation for office holders to manage them, and require members of parliament to submit an interest declaration as a minimum upon entry and any renewal or change in public office. However, regulations do not require members of the Government, the highest bodies of the judiciary, public employees in a high-risk position, and top-tier civil servants to submit interest declarations. Furthermore, Switzerland has no regulations which establish the institutional responsibilities on submission, compliance, and content verification procedures for interest declarations, nor which define sanctions for breaches of conflict-of-interest provisions in the executive and judiciary branches. Switzerland has not provided data on the practice of conflict-of-interest safeguards. However, a measure in place to prevent corruption and promote integrity are the personal security checks (contrôles de sécurité relatifs aux personne, CSP) applicable to senior civil servants of the federal administration.

Political finance

As measured against OECD standards on political finance, Switzerland fulfils 60% of criteria on regulation and 29% of criteria on implementation, compared to the OECD average of 73% and 58%, respectively.

Switzerland has regulations which require political parties to report their finances during electoral campaigns, and to make their financial reports public including all contributions exceeding a fixed ceiling. Regulations ban anonymous donations and contributions from foreign states and enterprises, and define sanctions for breaches of political finance and election campaign regulations. In practice, an independent body (Federal Audit Office) has the mandate to oversee the financing of political parties and election campaigns and has certified auditors on its payroll. Following recent legislation on political finance (Ordonnance sur la transparence du financement de la vie politique, 2022), the financial reports for election campaigns in 2023 are publicly available, but the annual financial reports of political parties are not.

Transparency of public information

As measured against OECD standards on public information, which includes access to information and open data, Switzerland fulfils 44% of criteria on regulation and 58% on implementation, compared to the OECD average of 67% and 62%, respectively.

The only restrictions to access to public information allowed in Switzerland are listed by law and are in line with the Tromso Convention (although not ratified by Switzerland), and the regulations establish the right to appeal in the case of refusal or inactivity of an administrative agency. The Swiss Constitution obliges the government to proactively inform the general public fully and in good time about its activities, unless overriding public or private interests prevent this. As of December 2022, regulations do not require information holders to provide information in the requested format, and do not define a list of datasets and mandatory information to be disclosed. In practice, there is proactive disclosure of datasets for the consolidated versions of all primary laws, the state budget for the current calendar year, the result of the last national elections, legislative proposals of the government, public tenders and their results, the aggregated data on access to information requests, the company registry, and the land registry. Nevertheless, data on Government’s agenda, ministers’ agenda, and asset and interest declarations of high-level officials are not published. However, the Federal Act on the Use of Electronic Means for the Fulfilment of Public Authority Tasks (EMBAG) enacted in 2023, establishes that government data is “open by default”.