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Scholarship demonstrated the major role of inheritance and kinship for elite's power reproduction, particularly among noble families. In the absence of monarchic and court structures, ruling classes that enjoyed privileges and engaged in social closure could become the functional equivalent of a nobility. In this paper, we examine the evolution of the power of Swiss patrician families in the three major Swiss cities (Basel, Geneva, and Zurich) since the end of the nineteenth century and assess whether urban oligarchies endure in the twentieth century and what role kinship ties play in the reproduction of power structures. Building on a systematic database of 5,199 urban elites who hold power positions in the main economic, political, academic, and cultural institutions, we describe the evolution of Swiss patrician families between 1890 and 1957. Using social network, kinship, and sequence analysis, we provide a comprehensive investigation of the Swiss patrician elite's evolution at both the individual and the family level. Our analyses show a general decline of patrician families' presence in urban positions of power, however with significant variations according to both the cities and the spheres of activity. Furthermore, we identify distinct trajectories of families who have either lost their access to power positions, managed to access again or have remained in urban power positions according to different survival strategies. Beyond the Swiss case, we contribute to the literature on power and kinship through an interdisciplinary approach combining historical and sociological perspectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Swiss Vocational Education and Training (VET) is based on national legislation which was introduced in the 1930s and renewed in the 1960s (as well as in the 1970s and in 2002). At first, the goal of the national VET legislation was to further Vocational Education and Training in order to support small and medium enterprises; however, later, it also included industry and services and has more recently grown to support the learners themselves. The 1963 national legislation and the following implementation acts in the cantons were decisive in shaping the Swiss VET system from a historical and comparative perspective. We argue that still today we do not have a unified, national system of education, but rather e cantonal modes of education and also of VET. However, the cantonal actors—with a specific focus on Ticino, Geneva, and Zurich—argue with similar justifications, when it comes to the reform of VET. Nevertheless, within this national legal framework, the cantons adopt rather different solutions. The result is that different (language specific) regional pathways of VET were established, based on various education and training regimes. In this research paper, we aim to concentrate on the years from 1950 to 1970, a period that turns out to be particularly significant for the development of Swiss VET. We focus our research on the introduction of the Vocational Training Act in 1963 and look in detail at the extent to which the cantons developed their corresponding implementation acts from the perspectives of different motives and logics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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