The Foreign Minister’s legacy
Micheline Calmy-Rey’s stubbornness has irked many at one time or another, us included. On balance, however, she and her management team are leaving behind a foreign policy legacy worth continuing. It may be described with the terms «universalism» and «active neutrality».
Universalism is about whether our foreign policy should be understood as a European policy or should reach out even further. Calmy-Rey and her people have used the «Europe fatigue» following the row over EU accession in the 1990s to strengthen Switzerland’s ties with all other continents, though not neglecting the EU dossier as a result (Bilaterals II, Free movement of persons).
In the UN, Switzerland has stood out for its unorthodox alliances reaching across all continents and has contributed to articulating the interests of States that do not have a permanent seat on the Security Council and are not members of the G8 or G20.
Attempts to forge «strategic partnerships» with the emerging countries were over-ambitious (which western country would not want to?), but ties have in fact been strengthened considerably. Finally Calmy-Rey also discovered the significance of the web of relationships created by development cooperation and its decades-long partnerships. Reports are that some in the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs now favour refocusing foreign policy more on Europe in the future. By this they mean, amongst other things, more embassies and consulates in EU countries, which is not necessarily a hallmark of current foreign policy.
Calmy-Rey used «active neutrality» to move even further away from the foreign policy of non-engagement that Switzerland had practised up to the end of the Cold War. This has been borne out for example by her rare, targeted violations of the «spirit of neutrality» with which she marked her distance from the West’s leading power, or her support for the civil society Israeli-Palestinian peace plan. This concept of neutrality as «non-alignment» is also suitable for the coming years, which will see the continued crumbling of western dominance.
When Switzerland did nonetheless get into difficulties, it was not Calmy-Rey’s doing but the result of an international tax policy that sought to secure the interests of the financial industry against those of many other countries. As in the case of money laundering, Switzerland was also forced to give ground on the matter of protecting foreign tax evaders. It was officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs who acted as the fire fighters in that emergency. If something must be changed about foreign policy, it is this regard, for Switzerland attempts to secure advantages at the expense of other countries, in disregard of all power relationships.
Peter Niggli, Director, Alliance Sud
Editorial published in: Alliance Sud News, No. 70, Winter 2011/12
