A confederation held together by difference
Switzerland dates its founding to a pact of 1291 among Alpine communities resisting outside rule, and grew into a loose confederation that formalised into a federal state in 1848. It has no single language, religion or ethnicity binding it; what holds it together is a political system of extreme decentralisation and direct democracy, in which citizens vote on referendums several times a year. Executive power is shared among a seven-member Federal Council, and the presidency rotates annually, so few can name the head of state.
Neutrality, declared after the Napoleonic wars and honoured through both world wars, made Switzerland a haven, a mediator and a headquarters. Geneva hosts the United Nations' European seat, the Red Cross, which the Swiss founded, and countless international bodies. The country joined the UN only in 2002 and remains outside the EU.
No colony, but a hand in Africa's wealth
Switzerland is the honest case where the colonial thread is thin but not absent. It held no African territory, yet Swiss merchants, banks and mercenaries profited from the slave and colonial economies at the edges, financing plantations and insuring slave voyages. The sharper connection is modern. Geneva and the low-tax canton of Zug are the world capital of commodity trading: firms such as Glencore, Trafigura, Vitol and Mercuria, headquartered on Swiss soil, handle an enormous share of the oil, copper, cobalt and cocoa that leave African ground.
That trade has repeatedly drawn scandal, from opaque deals with African governments to pollution and pricing disputes, and campaigners argue that the profits and the taxes stay in Switzerland while the costs stay in Africa. Swiss banks have also been the destination of choice for looted African wealth, and the long, grinding effort to return the fortune of Nigeria's General Abacha, hundreds of millions of dollars, has become the test case for how, and whether, stolen assets ever go home.
Precision, prosperity and reserve
Switzerland's economy is a study in high-value niches: the pharmaceutical giants Novartis and Roche, the watchmakers of the Jura, the private banks of Zurich and Geneva, and a tradition of discretion that survived the erosion of banking secrecy in the 2010s. Living standards are among the world's highest and the politics famously stable, though debates over migration, the EU and its own history keep the country arguing quietly with itself.