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The institutional arrangements that characterize the Swiss, corporatist-like, decision-making system were designed at a time when the impact of the "outside world" on both the form and content of legislative acts was presumably very low. With the deepening of the processes of economic globalization and political internationalization, however, an increasing number of issues that used to be domestic in nature are now co-defined at the international level and/or strongly influenced by norms elaborated abroad.
Against this background, the purpose of this project is to evaluate the impact of the internationalization/globalization processes on the national decision-making system and related institutional arrangements in Switzerland. In order to do so, we shall intend to rely on a double strategy. First, we will carry out a "before-after" analysis, that is, a comparison between the characteristics of the Swiss decision-making institutions and processes in the most recent legislative period (1995-99), with those at an earlier stage of the internationalization process (legislative period 1971-75). While data already exists for the period 1971-75, corresponding data - on the institutional setting, the duration of decision making processes, the importance and level of conflictuality of a given act, etc. - will have to be gathered for the legislature 1995-99. All legislative acts which were treated by the Swiss parliament between 1995 and 1999 and which were either initiated by a popular initiative or subject to a referendum (presumably around 200 acts) will be included in the quantitative analysis. Second, we will carry out a more detailed, but still mostly quantitative, network analysis of a small sample of the "most important" legislative acts of the period 1995-99. We shall focus on three legislative acts that differ with respect to their "international-national" character: a "purely" domestic policy decision, and two types of "mixed" decision. For this part of the study, socio-metric data collected through structured interviews with the relevant political elites will be the main source of information.
The first general assumption of this project is that the process of internationalization has induced changes in the institutional framework of the Swiss decision-making system. Most noticeably, internationalization is expected to have limited the formal consultation/ concertation procedures during the legislative process. The "before-after" analysis will help test whether and to what extent these changes have actually occurred. The second general assumption is that the changes in the decision-making institutions brought about by internationalization have influenced the distribution of political power in the Swiss political system. The policy network analysis in the three selected policy domains will help highlight the possible changes in power relations and how they are related to institutional changes.

The research focuses on factors (internal and environmental) and processes that promote or support the aging person's independence, his/her physical and mental integrity, and his/her participation in society. It also analyzes the factors that hinder or undermine these aspects. This objective is pursued by means of a cross-sectional survey of a representative sample of the population aged 63 and over of two typical regions (Canton of Geneva and Central Valais) in 1979. The choice of the two survey regions was explains by the fact that they typologically constitute the two extremes of the range representing the diversity of the situations of the elderly in Switzerland. This cross-sectional survey is repeated in 1994 and completed by a longitudinal survey (1994-1999) on the cohort of 80-84 year-olds living at home at the time of the cross-sectional survey of 1994. This design makes a comparison possible of the evolution and changes of the aged condition over 15 years.
The research is part of the theoretical perspective of the life course. A "horizontal" (class) social stratification articulates a "vertical" stratification, a social organization of life time, defining stages and transitions. The hypothesis is that the position occupied in the life course is a better indicator than age both in terms of defining situations and standard problems as in relation to the practices of aging people. The idea is to construct and validate a life course position indicator (LPI) combining the individual position in three dimensions: the health journey, the family trajectory, the professional trajectory.
Through the results of the research, we want to contribute to a reflection on the ethical foundations of research in gerontology and a policy of old age, the definition of present and future needs of aging people, and to highlight possible linkages between the support provided by family or self-help networks, and various forms of institutional support.