Coercion still an issue in Swiss welfare system, report finds
A May 2023 poster publicising canton Bern’s “Cedar” project, which aimed to highlight the fates of those affected by coercive state welfare measures last century.
Keystone / Anthony Anex
The rights of people in vulnerable situations are still sometimes disregarded within the Swiss welfare system, a national research programme has found.
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Keystone-SDA
While there have been developments in child and adult protection measures in recent decades, these have only been partially implemented in practice, according to the final report of the Swiss National Science Foundation’s (SNSF) ‘Welfare and Coercion’ National Research Programme (NRP 76), published on Thursday.
The project concluded that there was still a lot of work to be done, particularly around the participation of those affected. It said that legitimised measures were still associated with coercion in certain situations and cantonal disparities also led to legal inequalities.
The Swiss social welfare system still bears the legacy of compulsory measures and forced placements which affected hundreds of thousands in the 20th century, the SNSF said in a press release.
However, the report, in which some 150 researchers participated, also found that improvements had been made in many areas, particularly when it came to best interests of children involved.
Adapted from German by DeepL/kp,dos
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