Topic

In spring 2024, the Swiss resident population determined the topic of the Citizens' Assembly by means of a representative survey. Over 40% of respondents voted to discuss the issue of “rising health costs” in the Citizens' Assembly – ahead of other important political challenges.

The respondents most frequently justified their choice of topic with the increasing financial burden on households, which is becoming unbearable for a large proportion of the population. Many also saw the Citizens' Assembly as an opportunity to hold a solution-oriented discussion free from the influence of special interests and to set new impulses. The fact that the population is affected also plays an important role: since everyone is directly affected by health care and rising health costs, many have a personal connection to this topic.

A team from Interface  Politikstudien Forschung Beratung AG was commissioned to provide expert advice to the Center for Democracy Studies Aarau on the design of the Citizens' Assembly. A policy analysis on the topic of “rising health costs” written by Interface serves as a basis for the project team. This analysis identifies five topics related to rising health costs:

• Basic insurance
• Hospitals
• Expansion of services
• Coordination of care
• Health promotion and prevention

In addition to the advice provided by Interface, experts in the various topics are brought in to support the process. They provide specific content-related input on the individual topics and are available to answer questions from the participants of the Citizens' Assembly in a direct exchange.

It is not possible for all five topics to be treated equally in the Citizens' Assembly. For this reason, the participants in the Citizens' Assembly will jointly determine during the opening weekend in Zurich which of these five topics they would like to focus on in the further discussions.

In April 2024, 22,000 people from all over Switzerland received a letter inviting them to participate in the Citizens' Assembly. Each invited person could select one of five proposed topics. More than 40% of the respondents chose the topic of “rising healthcare costs” – ahead of the topics of energy supply, neutrality policy, financing of old-age provision and European policy.

The project team preselected eleven topics. In addition to the suitability of the topics for a Citizens' Assembly, surveys on the concerns of the Swiss population (e.g. the Worry Barometer) were taken into account. In a further step, all political parties were consulted in order to incorporate their priorities. Based on these inputs, the population was given a selection to vote on.