History
- The Concordance system started in 1891 with the election of Joseph Zemp, a conservative, in a then entirely Free Democratic executive. The fact that this led to a reduced opposition from the outside of the government has since been referred to as "The Zemp effect".
- From 1959 to 2003, the executive had the same party composition (2 Free Democratic Party, 2 Social Democratic, 2 Christian Democratic, and 1 Swiss People's Party.), based on the unwritten rule called the "magic formula". Since then, the composition changed to respect the proportionality rule after the rise of the Swiss People's Party.
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