It's a map of Switzerland but the position of the towns and cities are morphed by the social/political leanings of the inhabitants. Left to right wing in the left-right axis (natch) and liberal to conservative in the down up. So it's a bit like the Political Compass, if you know what that is but flipped in the y-direction. Hence sensible towns should appear at the top left of this diagram whereas sensible people appear at the bottom left of political compass.

Then, in red you've got French Switzerland, Green the German bit, and Orange the Italian bit.

So, lifting a few comments out of the blog article:

-- The French-Swiss area generally is more liberal and left-wing than the rest of Switzerland.    

-- If one draws a line from the map's "southwestern" to its "northeastern" corner, one notices that Deutschschweiz (German-Switzerland) takes up the entire conservative/right-wing half of the island.     [ OK, that's saying the same as above, really, isn't it. ]

-- The only German-speaking areas outside of this half are the urban centres of Basel, Zurich, Bern, Luzern** and Sankt-Gallen. These are the more liberal and left-wing than the rest of German-speaking Switzerland.    [ OK, I suppose that's normal. ]

So that's what the map nerds say, but is it true? I guess this is all rather well documented -- I just thought the map was quite cool.  Do you really feel the difference so strongly crossing between French and German Switzerland? Can anybody comment on it?

hayes, Aug 19, 09 14:21

That's a creative way of illustrating a country's political profile!
I am no expert in swiss politics, and I wish there was some explanation (or is there and I missed it?) about what criteria were used for the classification. Did they apply a sort of test/questionnaire, such as the one on the Political Compass site (which, btw, I did not know and found quite interesting too)? Since they point cities (communes?) as reference, I guess they considered election/referendums results rather than individual answers. I always find myself scratching behind my ear when I remember that "majority" may refer to that of the cantons, and not necessarily that of the population.

_Marina_, Aug 20, 09 04:50

 Hey Marina,

I like it a lot but I'm also finding it rather hard to figure out exactly what they did.

I said that the positions of the towns were "morphed" in my above post, because that's what the blogger wrote, but I don't think that's how it works at all. The blogger writes "there is very little left of Switzerland’s familiar shape to recognise" but I suspect that they didn't even start from any geographical representation of Switzerland. That French on the left, German on the right and Italian bottom in the middle; Geneva west of Lausanne, it's all coincidental. There are no lakes. But that said, How they get the outline of the map I have no idea.

Here is the page where the original authors describe it but the explanation is not very detailed. It's in German. About half way down the page is a link to an English language PDF file where they describe a little (really not much) more. They list Ideologies (left/right, modernist/traditionalist) against the Thematic Conflicts (Social welfare/Economic Self-Reliability, Integration/Separation of foreigners, etc.) that define them, but I don't know whether that's illustrative and general or if it's particular to this study. I don't know whether the axis labeling -30 to +30 has any real meaning.

As for the data, somebody in the comments writes: "their dataset is based on referenda (the 218 ‘yes/no’ polls of 2896 municipalities, from 1982 to 2005)." -- you were absolutely right.


Come on: where did you score on the political compass? ;)





hayes, Aug 20, 09 09:56

 Side by side with the Dalai Lama, OK? I'm such a nice kid.


_Marina_, Aug 20, 09 14:44

That's the best quadrant to be in (as defined by both me and the Canton of Geneva).

hayes, Aug 20, 09 16:30

That's the best quadrant to be in (as defined by both me and the Canton of Geneva).

hayes, Aug 20, 09 16:30

I know! Did u check the bunch of composers placed there? Pas mal...
So, I assume you too hang around the same neighbourhood?
Who else?
.
.
.
.
Hello?

Are there any voters to confirm/contest the map?

_Marina_, Aug 20, 09 18:27

 This is pretty cool!


The Political Compass

Economic Left/Right: -4.00
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.46
Lannah, Aug 20, 09 18:52

 Hi,
I am swiss-french born in Geneva.
I find this map - however interesting - a bit caricatural.
The main differences in Switzerland are cultural - 4 languages - different people.
The swiss-germans views us as retards. They adore the swiss-italians.
We mock the swiss-germans because of their thick language and, yes,
they can be boriiiiiiiiing !
But, what is the fuss anyway : 1 part is rather latin and the other germanic.
No wonder there are clashes and weird love stories too...
Matina Sakkas, Aug 20, 09 21:25

What did you lot all click strongly agree with "I burn crosses when I'm not campaigning for tax abolition and the right to shoot people darker than myself"?

@ _Marina_ : I hadn't seen the composers thing; it wasn't there when I last looked at PC. It's rather fun. It's nice to see Schoenberg and Bartok occupy the same space, when I seem to remember a few releases featuring both of them. I'm surprised that non of them are more libertarian than about -4, though. It almost makes me suspect that it's hard to get lower than -5 if you were born in the 19th century or before. But yeah, that and the gap between Schumann and Haydn makes me suspect their method, rather than any real break in the distribution. It's illustrative but probably (with good reason) rather badly calibrated.

Also, I didn't know that Woody Allen quote:
Woody Allen quipped that every time he heard Wagner, he was overcome with the urge to invade Poland. That's genius.

I'm here:

hayes, Aug 20, 09 22:43

Great to have a Swiss person here -- thanks!

You say it's caricaturial. I see why you say that but isn't it the other way around? I suspect the method is relatively rigourous. I think the study started with the referendum data; the towns could have ended up anywhere on the diagram. The startling thing is that when you colour-code the result by language, the language regions divide so perfectly along political quantities. That while the towns in principle could have landed at any point on the axes, they didn't. Yes it conforms to a stereotype, but if the study is done well (who knows whether that is true? -- it certainly could be subject to a strong confirmation bias) then what we are seeing is a confirmation, not something that grew out of preconception. Or rather, just because an observation fulfils a stereotype, that doesn't mean that it is not true.

hayes, Aug 20, 09 23:05

Oh, I just did PC again. In 2 years I have come in from -9.25 to -8.75 on the economic scale and in from -7.54 to -7.49 on the social scale. We all become less tolerant as we age, I suppose... But on the bright side, that implies that I'll reach the extreme of fiscal conservatism by the age of 107. Even more optimistically, it will take me seven centuries to become a full blown nazi.

Good enough.

hayes, Aug 20, 09 23:29

(quote)
"it will take me seven centuries to become a full blown nazi."
(unquote)

You, Allen and Bartók!

_Marina_, Aug 21, 09 03:45

 I can't believe that Geneva is in the 'left-liberal' corner! It's the most conservative place I've ever been to (outside of my grandfather's house)! Glad I don't live in the German part.

charlotta, Aug 21, 09 16:32