The Foundation was pleased to welcome Mr Franz A. Blankart, former Secretary of State of the Swiss Confederation, who gave a conference on the European Economic Area (EEA) on 4 October 2012 on the Dorigny University campus. Mr Blankart, who was Swiss chief negotiator for the EEA, captivated an audience of around 200 people with a very detailed analysis of the current state and prospects of relations between Switzerland and the European Union.
• Biographical note (in French)
• Read the text of Mr. Blankart’s conference (in French)
• Listen to the report on Thursday, 4 October, 2012 in the radio program “Forum” – RTS-la 1ère (in French)
• Read the article published in the daily newspaper 24 heures on Friday, 5 October, 2012 (in French)
As part of its European conferences, the Jean Monnet Foundation for Europe invited Franz Blankart, former Secretary of State of the Swiss Confederation, to share his thoughts on the European Economic Area (EEA), of which he was the chief negotiator for Switzerland. The future of relations between Switzerland and the European Union was discussed as a backdrop. In front of a large audience, gathered on the campus of the University of Lausanne, the President of the Foundation, José Maria Gil-Robles, presented this great Swiss diplomatic figure, honoured with many distinctions, but also a person of literature and culture. Mr Blankart’s thesis is simple: Switzerland missed an opportunity and lost many years when, by a vote on 6 December 1992, it refused to ratify the Porto Treaty on the EEA that it had just signed with the other EFTA countries and the European Community with the idea of expanding the European internal market.
The main issue, according to him, was the Federal Council’s announcement, at the time it was preparing to conclude the EEA Treaty, that its strategic objective was pure and simple accession. For some time now, the European Union has expressed its reluctance to continue the path of bilateral negotiations without a stronger institutional basis. In this respect, the speaker expressed serious doubts that the European Union could agree to the latest Swiss proposals. Admittedly, Switzerland could now accept the idea of automatically adopting the rules governing the development of a homogeneous internal market, with whose preparation it would be associated, as in the EEA, but only in a bilateral international context.
However, it would still refuse to submit to any supranational authority (such as the EFTA Court and the EFTA Surveillance Authority within the EEA). Why should Switzerland have an advantage over other EFTA countries in this respect? Moreover, has Switzerland not already accepted the intervention of a “foreign judge” in the European Court of Human Rights, for example? Mr Blankart concluded: since the prospect of accession to the European Union remains distant, and renunciation of future bilateral agreements would be costly for Switzerland, the EEA remains the only solution, provided that it is adapted to today’s situation. This was followed by a question-and-answer session with the audience, opened by Diplomatic Minister Philippe Nell, former collaborator of Mr Blankart, author of an edition of the Foundation’s Red Book Collection on the negotiation of the EEA, and by the President of the Grand Council of the Canton of Vaud, Mr Philippe Martinet, who honoured the event with his presence. While the debate highlighted the sensitive nature of the question of Switzerland’s place in Europe, everyone could only be touched by Mr Blankart’s personality and the frankness of his presentation. This was still evident in the discussions that continued during the aperitif offered to the public by the Direction of the University of Lausanne.
