Swiss voters may have rejected the ‘Sustainability Initiative’ proposed by the right-wing Swiss People’s Party (SVP) to cap the national population at 1 crore until 2050, but the debate mirrors internal migration dynamics globally. In India, inter-state migration (particularly from states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh) is frequently blamed for overcrowding and straining infrastructure in major metros.
Switzerland’s population currently stands at 91 lakh. Under the country’s direct democracy, citizens can propose amendments to the Constitution if they can get one lakh valid signatures within 18 months. The SVP argued that a growing number of immigrants from neighbouring European Union (EU) countries was putting increased pressure on infrastructure and environment. The party cited housing shortages, rising rents, overcrowded trains, congested roads and loss of green spaces as evidence, saying that current growth levels were no longer sustainable.
The surprise element
Prof Michael Siegenthaler, head of Research Division, Swiss Labor Market, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich, says support for the cap was highest precisely where density, population growth, crime, and the foreign-born share were the lowest. “This looks less like lived density stress than an abstract fear of change — what psychologists call neophobia: the anxiety about losing a familiar culture, values, identity,” he points out.
According to the Swiss Migration Report 2025, of the 91 lakh people living in Switzerland, 24 lakh are foreign nationals, with two-thirds being from an EU/EFTA country. If approved, the initiative would have required the government to restrict asylum and family reunification, besides termination of the Free Movement of Persons agreement with EU. Since signing the pact in 1999, which allows citizens of EU countries to work, study, and live in Switzerland (and vice versa), the Alpine country has witnessed strong economic growth. Its GDP has risen from roughly $314 billion in 2002 (when the agreement came into effect) to nearly $1 trillion. As per World Bank, Switzerland has the sixth highest GDP per capita.
The outsider debate
The Swiss Federal Staistical Office report says that nearly a third of the permanent residents were born abroad. Immigrants have played a major role in the growth story of Switzerland, which hosted 1.65 lakh foreign workers last year. “Firms met skill shortages by recruiting from the EU, which, in turn, fuelled demand and allowed them to grow in ways that wouldn’t otherwise have been possible,” says Prof Siegenthaler, referring to Switzerland’s much-discussed ‘job miracle’.
“A significant cut to immigration would tighten the labour market, most acutely in health and elderly care, hospitality, construction, and IT/research. Immigrants are disproportionately working-age net contributors, so the state pension system’s finances deteriorate as their inflow is curtailed. The bottom line is that lower immigration would not avert ageing; it would deepen labour shortages and slow growth while the fiscal cost of an older society keeps rising,” he adds.
The Indian parallel
India, which is confronting population pressures like strained public infrastructure, soaring housing costs, and overcrowded cities, faces similar debates. Videos showing large-scale reverse migration of labourers during Covid-19, and more recently during the LPG supply disruptions, have been cited as examples of how outsiders are flooding metros. In 2008, the ‘sons of soil’ narrative was responsible for the mass exodus of migrant workers from Maharashtra. Their departure severely affected construction and real estate sectors.
“The Swiss debate offers a useful lens for examining how concerns about jobs, housing, and public services can become politicised and directed against migrants, even within national borders,” says Prof Santosh Jatrana, India-born demographer and migration researcher at Deakin University, Australia.
“Just as migration became entwined with concerns about jobs, housing, and public services in the Swiss debate, linguistic politics and ‘sons of the soil’ campaigns in India often portray inter-state migrants as competitors for jobs and public resources rather than as citizens and workers who contribute to the economies of destination states. During Covid-19, we saw how quickly interstate migrants could be treated as outsiders,” says Prof Jatrana, who was in Switzerland during the referendum. India’s demographic future, she adds, will increasingly depend on inter-state migration, particularly as younger workers from poorer states help sustain the economies of ageing and low-fertility regions. “Yet these migrants are too often treated as outsiders rather than as Indian citizens.”
The Swiss and Indian contexts, experts stress, demonstrate that targeting migrants often stems from political narratives and cultural anxieties rather than economic logic. Future stability depends on effective infrastructure planning and recognising migrants as essential economic contributors rather than an unsustainable burden.
