Wiedergutmachungsinitiative

Wiedergutmachungsinitiative (literal: reparation initiative) in Switzerland, is a so-called Volksinitiative, i.e. a request to suggest federal law by direct democracy, started in April 2014.

Summary

In April 2014 the collection of targeted at least authenticated 100,000 signatures of Swiss citizens has started, that have to be collected to 1 October 2015. That popular initiative primarily tries to take care of the fates of forced child laborers in Switzerland, the so-called Verdingkinder, a former term used in Swiss-German language. That practice, another then claimed 'integration project' related to the so-called 'misplaced persons', affeced tenthousands of juveniles which were placed as cheap laborers at Swiss farms, among them also Fahrende or Jenisch juveniles affected by the then Swiss foundation Kinder der Landstrasse – but not their families.

The initiative, probably a unique fact in the Swiss media culture, is actively supported by the newspaper Der Schweizerische Beobachter that also participated to reveal the backgrounds of the fates of Verdingkinder, and the Kinder der Landstrasse foundation. The popular initiative – set up by Guido Fluri and other prominent Swiss citizens, among them the Swiss writer Lukas Hartmann – is supported among others also by the parent organization of the Swiss churches and the association of the Swiss teachers.

Aims (excerpt)

The initiative, incidentally started by an inter-political committee as there were missing adequate measurements by the Swiss governmental authorities, claims:

• Reparation for victims of forced child laborers and welfare-driven coercive measures;
• a scholarly review of this dark chapter of Swiss history;
• a fund over 500 million Swiss Francs;
• only severely affected victims obtain redress from;
• an independent commission will examine each case individually.

Backgrounds: 'Verdingkinder' and 'Kinder der Landstrasse'

Verdingkinder (literally: "contract children" or "indentured child laborers") were children who were in Switzerland taken from their parents, often due to poverty or moral reasons – usually among others mothers being unmarried, very poor citizens, of Gypsy–Yeniche (Swiss German also Fahrende) origin – and sent to live with new families, often poor farmers who needed cheap labour. Many of these children, now adults, have now come forward to say that they were severely mistreated by their new families, suffering neglect, beatings and other physical and psychological abuse. There were even auctions where children were handed over to the farmer asking least money from the authorities, thus securing cheap labour for his farm and relieving the authority from the financial burden of looking after the children. In the 1930s, p.e. in the Canton of Bern about 20% of all agricultural laborers were children below the age of 15. Swiss municipality guardianship authorities acted so, commonly tolerated by federal authorities, to the 1960s, not all of them of course, but usually communities affected of low taxes in some Swiss cantons. The Swiss historian Marco Leuenberger investigated, that in 1930 there were some 35,000 indentured children, and between 1920 and 1970 more than 100,000 are believed to have been placed with families or homes. 10,000 Verdingkinder, women and men in Switzerland, are still alive in the mid-2010s.

Supplement of the Swis Federal Constitution claimed by the initiative

The initiative claims, the Swiss Federal Constitution has to be amended as follows:

Art. 124a Wiedergutmachung für die Opfer von fürsorgerischen Zwangsmassnahmen und Fremdplatzierungen, literally reparation for the victims of welfare step coercive measures and foreign placements:

1. The Confederation and the Cantons shall provide for compensation for the injustice, which have suffered particular resident, Verdingkinder, administrative supplied, or forcibly sterilized forced adopted people and Fahrende (a Swiss-German term for literally Yeniche people) as a result-driven welfare coercion or foreign placements.
2. To provide independent scientific review of these measures and promote discussion about it in the public.

Art. 196 Ziff. 1212. Übergangsbestimmung zu Art. 124a (Wiedergutmachung für die Opfer von fürsorgerischen Zwangsmassnahmen und Fremdplatzierungen), literally Transitional provision to Art. 124a (reparation for the victims of welfare step coercive measures and foreign placements):

1. The Swiss Confederation establishes a fund in the amount of 500 million Swiss Frances for the victims of welfare step coercive measures and foreign placements that were done before 1981.
2. Eligible are people who were directly affected and hard of such measures. The amount of restitution depends on the sustained injustice. About the payment of benefits an independent commission has to concluse.
3. The fund is dissolved twenty years after its creation. Any residual amount will be refunded proportionately to the depositors.

Status

On 19 December 2014 the initiative was submitted at the Federal Chancellery (Bundeskanzlei).

See also

• Child labour in Switzerland
• Kinder der Landstrasse
• Verdingkinder

Literature (excerpt)

• Marco Leuenberger & Loretta Seglias (editors): Versorgt und vergessen. Ehemalige Verdingkinder erzählen. Rotpunktverlag, Zürich 2008, ISBN 978-3858693822
• Lotty Wohlwend & Arthur Honegger: Gestohlene Seelen: Verdingkinder in der Schweiz. Huber Verlag, Bern, ISBN 978-3719313654
• Sara Galle and Thomas Meier: Von Menschen und Akten - die Aktion Kinder der Landstrasse der Stiftung Pro Juventute. Chronos Verlag, Zürich 2009, ISBN 978-3034009447.
• Thomas Huonker, Regula Ludi: Roma, Sinti und Jenische. Schweizerische Zigeunerpolitik zur Zeit des Nationalsozialismus. Beitrag zur Forschung (Veröffentlichungen der UEK, Band 23). Chronos Verlag, Zürich 2001, ISBN 3-0340-0623-3
• Walter Leimgruber, Thomas Meier and Roger Sablonier, redaction by Bernadette Kaufmann: Kinder zwischen Rädern. Kurzfassung des Forschungsberichts «Das Hilfswerk für die Kinder der Landstrasse». Published by and in order of Bundesamt für Kultur «und Kinder» 20, Nr. 67, November 2001, Zürich 2001.

External links

• Official website (German)
• Wiedergutmachungsinitiative on the website of the Swiss Federal Chancery (Schweizerische Bundeskanzlei) (German)
• Wiedergutmachungsinitiative on the website of the Swiss television SRF (German)