The goal of our research and data project DemocraSci is to create a searchable database of the Swiss Parliament. For the past 130 years (starting in 1891), the Swiss Parliament has carefully documented its actions and debates in the so-called Amtliches Bulletin—a stenographic record of parliamentary speeches and legislative proposals. In our project we carefully extract and structure the data from the Amtliches Bulletin.
Our database will contain
- all bills, legislative proposals and parliamentary questions brought forth by members of the parliament, comittees, parliamentary groups (called Fraktionen) and cantons (in the form of a Standesinitative)
- all speeches recorded in the Amtliches Bulletin
- all members passing through the parliament as well as their functions, their committee memberships and their involvement in parliamentary affairs
- all votes and voting outcomes for proposals
- all cosponsorship signatures from members of parliament on bills
The project is a collaboration between our chair and the Swiss Data Science Center, SDSC.
Collaboration partners: Luis Salamanca (SDSC), Fernando Perez-Cruz (SDSC)
Project start: fall 2019
Project end: 2022