In Switzerland, women have had the right to vote and stand for election at the federal level since 1971: ch.ch looks back at the long road to women’s suffrage (web page available in German, French and Italian).
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Female representation in the Federal Assembly has come a long way. While only 11 women were elected in 1971, there were a record 96 female members of parliament out of 246 after the 2019 federal elections. The number dropped to 93 after the 2023 federal elections.
The proportion of women rose in the Council of States but fell in the National Council. The proportion of women in both chambers was more than one third for the first time.
The number of female members of the Council of States rose from 12 to 16 out of 46, i.e. 34.8% of the chamber. Despite a loss of 7 seats, women remain slightly better represented on the National Council, with 77 out of 200 seats (38.5%).
Regional variations
Following the last federal election, women held the National Council seat or majority of seats in five cantons (BS, NW, OW, BL, FR). There was no female representation in seven cantons following the 2023 election (UR, GL, AR, AI, VS, NE, JU).
Since the end of 2023, Fribourg has been the only canton to be represented by two women in the Council of States. Both Basel-Stadt and Basel-Landschaft, which each have a single seat in the Council of States, are represented by women. Twelve other cantons have both one female and one male member. The remaining eleven are currently represented by men only.
In the Council of States, the proportion of women from French-speaking Switzerland is higher than that from German-speaking Switzerland (41.7% vs 34.4%). Ticino lost its female member of the Council of States after the 2023 election. Indeed, during the current legislature the proportion of female National Council members from German-speaking Switzerland (41.4%) is larger than that from the French-speaking cantons (34.6%) and Ticino (12.5%).
The average proportion of women in the cantonal parliaments is close to that in the Federal Assembly. At the end of 2023, the total number of women sitting on cantonal parliaments was 867, i.e. 33.4% of the total. The Neuchâtel parliament was the most female in Switzerland and the only one with a majority of women (58%).
Meanwhile, the Schwyz parliament had the lowest proportion of women of the Swiss cantons, although the March 2024 elections increased the figure to 20%, making Obwalden the only canton to have fewer than one woman in every five members of parliament.
ch.ch looks back at the history of parliamentary elections (web page available in French and German)
You can consult the report by the Federal Commission for Women's Issues on women in the 2023 federal elections (in French)
The Federal Statistical Office provides a range of statistics on female politicians (web page available in French and German)
The Federal Statistical Office provides statistics on female representation at cantonal and national level (web page available in French and German)