Is Switzerland becoming the black sheep of Europe?

 The Swiss People's Party may have scored another victory yesterday in their campaign against the "black sheep" within Swiss society, but judging by the reaction of the European press today it may be the Swiss themselves who are becoming the real black sheep. In a referendum held Sunday, 53% of the Swiss endorsed a far-right initiative to automatically expel foreign residents who have committed a crime, following their time served in a Swiss prison.

According to the AFP, Austrian website news.at announced the news with the headline, "Switzerland is now the black sheep -- majority for tougher rules against foreigers." The headline is a reference to the notorious advertising used by the far-right Swiss People's Party (SVP) showing a group of white sheep kicking a black sheep out of Switzerland. The imagery, which helped propel the SVP to a huge election win in 2007, was again brought out in the SVP's campaign for the expulsion initiative (but this time with a new twist, one of the white sheep has been stabbed!). The Austrian press wasn't the only one criticising the referendum outcome. Belgian newspaper Le Soir noted today that the Swiss are increasingly choosing a "radical road". German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung wrote that once again Switzerland is "sending a signal to the world that it doesn't care what others think of it." Many of the papers are noting that the vote comes exactly one year after the Swiss voted to ban minarets on mosques.

The white sheep win in Switzerland

Despite the "foreigner-friendly" win in Poland, the weekend saw a very different election result just a thousand kilometers away in Switzerland. The right-wing Swiss People’s Party (SVP), which has gained infamy in the past few months for running what many see as a blatantly racist ad campaign, won 29% of the vote this weekend and gained seven seats on the National Council. That makes SVP Switzerland’s largest party by a long shot.

Meanwhile Switzerland’s second-largest party, the center-left Social Democrats, had a disastrous weekend. They lost nine seats and had a 4 percent drop on its showing in 2003 elections. The party now has 43 seats on the 200-person National Council compared to the SVP's 62. SVP is led by the populist Christoph Blocher, who is one interesting character, let me tell you.

The news is highly disturbing to many in Europe because the result means that the party’s overtly racist campaign advertising was a huge success. The party had run a series of ads depicting three white sheep grazing on a Swiss flag, kicking a black sheep off of it. The ads were accompanied by the slogan, "for more security.”