Walter Buser (14 April 1926 – 17 August 2019) was a Swiss politician from the
Social Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei der Schweiz; SP; rm, Partida Socialdemocrata da la Svizra) or Swiss Socialist Party (french: Parti socialiste suisse, it, Partito Socialista Svizzero; PS), is a polit ...
(SDP).
Biography
Buser was born in
Lausen
Lausen is a municipality in the district of Liestal in the canton of Basel-Country in Switzerland.
History
Lausen is first mentioned in 1275 as ''in villa et banno Langenso''. In 1305 it became the property of the Bishop of Basel, passing in ...
, Switzerland, the son of a farmer. He studied at Bâle and at Bern, obtaining a doctorate in law in 1958. From 1950, he was a legal advisor and editor of Social-Democratic newspapers. From 1956 to 1962 he was chief editor of the "Socialist Federal House correspondence".
In 1965 he joined the federal administration and spent three years as head of the Legal and Information Service of the Department of Home Affairs. The Federal Council elected him Vice-Chancellor in 1968; in this capacity he was responsible for legal services and information throughout the federal administration. In 1977 he was appointed an Associate Professor of Public Law at the University of Basel, where he taught in particular the administrative law of the federation.
After the resignation of Chancellor Karl Huber in 1981, Buser campaigned against Joseph Voyame of the CVP and Hans-Ulrich Ernst of the SVP. He defeated his opponents and became the first Social Democratic chancellor. Buser introduced regular press conferences and expanded the Federal Chancellery to a staff office of the Federal Council. He also adopted electronic data processing for the Federal Chancellery. He resigned his post in 1991. Buser died on 17 August 2019 at the age of 93.
References
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