Cantons of Switzerland

Each canton has its own constitution, legislature, government and courts. Most of the cantons' legislatures are unicameral parliaments. Their size varies between 58 and 200 seats. A few legislatures are general assemblies (Landsgemeinden). The cantonal governments consist of either 5, 7 or 9 members, depending on the canton. All tasks that do not explicitly fall within the Confederation according to the Swiss Constitution are matters of the cantons. The cantons determine the degree of autonomy of the municipalities, thus this varies greatly.

In cantonal matters, direct democracy in the form of general assemblies (Landsgemeinde) is now confined to the cantons of Appenzell Innerrhoden and Glarus. In all other cantons democratic rights are expressed using the ballot box.

Since the creation of the Canton of Jura in 1978 there have been no new cantons. Sometimes the number of cantons is given as 23. In this case the cantons of Unterwalden, Appenzell and Basel are counted as two half-cantons each. Unterwalden is divided into Obwalden and Nidwalden, Appenzell into Innerrhoden and Ausserrhoden, while Basel is divided into Basel-Stadt and Basel-Landschaft. These divisions exist for historical reasons and still only affect the number of seats in the Council of States and voting in federal initiatives. The new constitution of 1999 now enumerates each of the 26 cantons separately.

List and map

Abbr	Canton	Since	Capital	Population1	Area2	Density3	Nr. of mun.s1	Official languages
ZH	Zurich (Zürich)	1351	Zurich	1,228,600	1,729	701	171	German
BE	Bern (Berne)	1353	Bern	947,100	5,959	158	399	German, French
LU	Lucerne	1332	Lucerne	350,600	1,493	233	107	German
UR	Uri	1291	Altdorf	35,000	1,077	33	20	German
SZ	Schwyz	1291	Schwyz	131,400	908	143	30	German
OW	Obwalden (Obwald)	1291	Sarnen	32,700	491	66	7	German
NW	Nidwalden (Nidwald)	1291	Stans	38,600	276	138	11	German
GL	Glarus	1352	Glarus	38,300	685	51	28	German
ZG	Zug	1352	Zug	100,900	239	416	11	German
FR	Fribourg	1481	Fribourg	239,100	1,671	141	242	French, German
SO	Solothurn	1481	Solothurn	245,500	791	308	126	German
BS	Basel-Stadt (Basle-City)	1501	Basel	186,700	37	5,072	3	German
BL	Basel-Landschaft (Basle-Country)	1501	Liestal	261,400	518	502	86	German
SH	Schaffhausen	1501	Schaffhausen	73,400	298	246	34	German
AR	Appenzell Ausserrhoden (Outer Rhodes)	1513	Herisau4	53,200	243	220	20	German
AI	Appenzell Innerrhoden (Inner Rhodes)	1513	Appenzell	15,000	173	87	6	German
SG	St. Gallen (St. Gall)	1803	St. Gallen	452,600	2,026	222	90	German
GR	Graubünden (Grisons)	1803	Chur	185,700	7,105	26	211	German, Romansh, Italian
AG	Aargau (Argovia)	1803	Aarau	550,900	1,404	388	232	German
TG	Thurgau (Thurgovia)	1803	Frauenfeld	228,200	991	229	80	German
TI	Ticino	1803	Bellinzona	311,900	2,812	110	244	Italian
VD	Vaud	1803	Lausanne	626,200	3,212	188	382	French
VS	Valais	1815	Sion	278,200	5,224	53	160	French, German
NE	Neuchâtel	1815	Neuchâtel	166,500	803	206	62	French
GE	Geneva	1815	Geneva	414,300	282	1,442	44	French
JU	Jura	1979	Delémont	69,100	838	82	83	French
CH	Switzerland		Bern	7,261,200	41,285	174	2,889	German, French, Italian, Romansh

Notes: ¹ on 31 December 2001, National Statistics, ² km², ³ per km², based on 2000 population ⁴ seat of government and parliament, the seat of the judicial authorities is Trogen.

The two letter abbreviations for Swiss cantons are widely used, e.g. on car license plates and in the ISO 3166-2 codes (with the prefix "CH-", i.e. CH-SZ for the canton of Schwyz).

Names in other languages

External links

• Map
• GeoPuzzle Assemble cantons on a Swiss map

Referenced By