1. A warning from the heart of Swiss constitutional law
Paul Richli's comments are in no way a political analysis.
This is a major legal warning from one of Switzerland's last leading constitutionalists.
And the warning is clear: the new Switzerland-EU agreements are not technical agreements - they are transformation agreements.
Richli is not describing a simple evolution, but a transformation of the Swiss political system.
2. A transfer of sovereignty without saying so: the end of the Swiss legislature
Richli points to the key to the mechanism: underneath these agreements,
«Parliament's legislative power would be reduced to a right of veto.»
A veto exercised under the threat of sanctions is a fictitious veto.
It's law under duress - and therefore lawless.
The EU is introducing a system where not obeying costs more than obeying, which mechanically transforms Parliament, and by extension the sovereign people, into a body of automatic approval.
3. The perfect trap: the creation of an anti-referendum cartel
Richli highlights a psychological and systemic effect that no one in the enthusiastic pro-EU editorials mentions:
«This could create a cartel against any referendum: no one will want to risk being affected by the compensatory measures.»
This is where direct democracy breaks down.
It is not Brussels that is banning referendums:
it is the individual, sectoral and economic risk that petrifies public debate.
A brilliant legal engineering strategy :
To create a system where the people no longer dare to vote freely, even if they still have the formal right to do so.
4. Extending the scope of European coercion
Richli adds that the number of areas subject to mandatory adoption of European law will explode:
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Electricity
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Food safety
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Multiple technical standards
And he points out a monumental contradiction:
Parties calling for stricter regulations to protect health or the environment will lose this right, because :
«It will no longer be possible to have stricter rules than those of the EU.»
In other words:
Switzerland is renouncing its precautionary principle, its regulatory culture and its regulatory autonomy.
5. The Federal Council: a guilty light touch
Richli is rare in its severity:
«The Federal Council has attached far too little importance to these treaties [...] you can see that there is no longer a legal expert in the Federal Council».»
This finding is explosive.
It implies that the guardian of the Constitution - the executive - has failed.
This institutional criticism is almost unprecedented since the 1990s.
6. The powerful quote that sums it all up
Here's the phrase that runs through the whole interview:
«These agreements will change Switzerland.»
- Paul Richli, NZZ am Sonntag, 16.11.2025
It is the legal equivalent of a national alarm signal.
Conclusion - Switzerland is not threatened by the EU: it is threatened by its own naivety
Paul Richli's comments do not condemn Brussels; ;
they condemn our short-sightedness.
The question is no longer:
«What advantages will we have?»
But well :
«How much sovereignty are we prepared to sacrifice without even calling it membership?»
These «Bilateral III Agreements» are in fact Unilateral Agreements III :
automatic adoption, sanctions in the event of refusal, structural constraints, gradual extirpation of direct democracy.
Switzerland is not being absorbed into an empire.
It abandons itself - out of political comfort, intellectual laziness, renunciation.
And it is precisely to avoid this that sovereignist vigilance is not a luxury: it is a constitutional necessity.