People <\/p>\n
To survive as a cohesive<\/a> unit and to protect the neutrality that has been their safeguard, the disparate<\/a> elements of the Swiss<\/a> people have had to learn a mutual cooperation. Their outlook has been shaped largely by economic and political necessity, which has made the Swiss public realistic, cautious, and prudent in accepting innovation<\/a> and creative in the use of their resources. Switzerland\u2019s human resource has been effectively educated and efficiently utilized to transform what was a predominantly mountainous, rural, and landlocked country<\/a> with limited natural resources into one of the most diversified and important industrial and commercial countries in the world.<\/p>\n Ethnic groups and languages <\/p>\n Most of the major cultural regions of western continental Europe\u2014German, French, and Italian\u2014come into contact in Switzerland. Thus, one of the country\u2019s distinctive features is the variety of its languages. The Swiss constitution<\/a> recognizes German<\/a>, French<\/a>, and Italian<\/a> as official languages. Since 1996 Romansh<\/a> (Rhaeto-Romance), a linguistic relic<\/a> preserved in the mountainous regions between the Gotthard massif and the eastern Alps<\/a>, has had official status at the federal level for communicating with Romansh-speaking persons (it had been designated as an official \u201cnational\u201d language in 1938). At the beginning of the 21st century, more than three-fifths of the total population spoke German, one-fifth French, about one-twelfth Italian, and less than 1 percent Romansh. Nearly one-tenth of the population spoke a nonofficial language, with people of Croatian, Portuguese, Serbian, and Spanish descent most prevalent in this category. The country\u2019s ethnic breakdown largely mirrors its linguistic divisions. Foreign residents make up about one-fifth of the country\u2019s total population, and in some cantons the proportion is considerably higher. For example, in Geneva<\/a> more than one-third of residents are foreigners. The foreign-born population in Switzerland increased substantially in the 1990s, when the country provided refuge to those fleeing the violence in Bosnia and Herzegovina<\/a> and in Kosovo<\/a>.<\/p>\n Religion <\/p>\n Switzerland also exhibits considerable religious diversity<\/a>. However, the distribution of religions does not coincide with that of languages, as the population shifts brought on by industrialization resulted in a greater mixture of religions. Roman Catholics slightly outnumber Protestants, and there is a small but significant Muslim population\u2014mainly of Turkish or Balkan origin\u2014and a tiny Jewish community<\/a>.<\/p>\n Chur, Switzerland<\/a>The Cathedral (left rear), the Episcopal (Bishop’s) Palace (center left rear), and the Church of St. Martin (right rear) at Chur, Switzerland.(more)<\/p>\n The constitution of 1874 guaranteed full religious liberty but repeated the 1848 constitution\u2019s prohibition of settlement by Jesuits<\/a> (members of the Roman Catholic Society of Jesus) and their affiliated<\/a> societies. This anti-Jesuit article was repealed in a national referendum in 1973. In 2009 the passage of a referendum to outlaw the construction of minarets<\/a> (towers that feature in the design of many mosques) highlighted widespread misgivings about the presence of Muslims in Switzerland. The minaret ban had been promoted by the conservative<\/a> Swiss People\u2019s Party<\/a>.<\/p>\n Although religion has been pivotal in shaping the country, church attendance and religiosity have declined substantially; about two-fifths of Roman Catholics and one-half of Protestants attend church regularly. About one-eighth of Swiss citizens profess no religious affiliation, a figure that increased in the last decades of the 20th century.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"People To survive as a cohesive unit and to protect the neutrality that has been their safeguard, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":51373,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[101,1543,1542,1541,17],"class_list":{"0":"post-58004","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-switzerland","8":"tag-article","9":"tag-britannica","10":"tag-encyclopeadia","11":"tag-encyclopedia","12":"tag-switzerland"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ch\/116491251012289815","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58004\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}