Abstract / Summary:
The relationships with the European Union (EU) have been at the top of the Swiss political agenda since more than fifteen years. Given the recent decision of the Federal Council to relaunch the bilateral talks with the EU, European policy will very likely remain one of the most crucial issues of Swiss politics in the next years to come. Against this background, the purpose of this interdisciplinary research project is to contribute to the evaluation of the opportunities and limits of the Swiss bilateral way. To this end, the project will raise two sets of questions. The first set regards the agenda-setting of the bilateral negotiations and the second set regards the content of a possible framework agreement that could bring together the existing treaties under a single institutional umbrella. The project will also evaluate the Swiss way of bilateral policies against other experiences (Japan and Korea with the EU). The study of the content of a possible framework agreement is legal in nature and will rely on a systematic analysis of the treaties that have been concluded between Switzerland and the EU so far, focusing on mixed committees, mechanisms of decision-making and dispute settlements.
