Walter Buser (14 April 1926 – 17 August 2019) was a

Swiss politician The government of Switzerland is a federal state with direct democracy. * The legislative branch is the Federal Assembly. The Federal Assembly has two parts: the National Council, which represents the public, while the Council of States ...

from the

Social Democratic Party of Switzerland The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland (, SP; ), also called the Swiss Socialist Party (; , PS), is a List of political parties in Switzerland, political party in Switzerland. The SP has had two representatives on the Federal Council (Switzerl ...

(SDP).

Early life and education

Buser was born in

Lausen Lausen is a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in the district of Liestal (district), Liestal in the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Basel-Country in Switzerland. History Lausen is first mentioned in 1275 as ''in villa et banno Langen ...

, Switzerland, the son of a farmer. He studied at the universities in

Basel Basel ( ; ), also known as Basle ( ), ; ; ; . is a city in northwestern Switzerland on the river Rhine (at the transition from the High Rhine, High to the Upper Rhine). Basel is Switzerland's List of cities in Switzerland, third-most-populo ...

and

Bern Bern (), or Berne (), ; ; ; . is the ''de facto'' Capital city, capital of Switzerland, referred to as the "federal city".; ; ; . According to the Swiss constitution, the Swiss Confederation intentionally has no "capital", but Bern has gov ...

, 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".

Career

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 An interior ministry or ministry of the interior (also called ministry of home affairs or ministry of internal affairs) is a government department that is responsible for domestic policy, public security and law enforcement. In some states, the i ...

. The

Federal Council Federal Council may refer to: Governmental bodies * Federal Council of Australasia, a forerunner to the current Commonwealth of Australia * Federal Council of Austria, the upper house of the Austrian federal parliament * Federal Council of German ...

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 Karl Huber was a notable Austrian international footballer. He made his mark on the football field, representing Admira Wien Admira Wacker is an Austrian professional Association football, football club based in Maria Enzersdorf, a town in ...

in 1981, Buser ran 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 into a staff office of the

. He also implemented electronic data processing within the Federal Chancellery. He resigned from his post in 1991.

Death

Buser died on 17 August 2019 at the age of 93.

Early life and education

Career

Death

References

Further reading