Although passed earlier, Switzerland’s 1931 residence law strongly shaped postwar recruitment by defining a “seasonal worker” status. The system supported short stays linked to employer needs and limited access to social protections for seasonal workers. This legal structure became central to how many Italian and later Spanish workers were admitted for temporary work.
Switzerland began actively managing labor immigration soon after World War II. A bilateral arrangement with Italy created an official framework for Italians to work in Switzerland, responding to Swiss labor demand and Italy’s labor surplus. This agreement became a foundation for the large postwar Italian workforce in Switzerland.
West Germany formalized labor recruitment with Italy through a bilateral accord on recruiting and placing Italian workers. It was the first in a wider series of recruitment agreements that helped West Germany address labor shortages during its postwar economic expansion. The agreement created state-supported channels for Italian workers to take jobs in West Germany.
West Germany added Spain to its recruitment system with a bilateral agreement. This widened the pool of workers available to German industry and linked Spanish emigration policy to job placement abroad. Spanish workers increasingly joined Italians as key groups in West Germany’s “guest worker” labor force.
Recruitment remained limited at first, then expanded sharply in the early 1960s as assembly-line industry demanded more labor. Italian workers were among the most visible early groups arriving through the treaty framework. This shift marked the start of mass labor migration to West Germany under the guest worker model.
As the foreign workforce grew, Switzerland adopted restrictions aimed at controlling the number of foreign workers. In 1963, Switzerland introduced a ceiling limiting how many foreign workers each employer could admit. This reflected a balancing act: continued recruitment for the economy, combined with political pressure to limit the foreign population.
Switzerland’s guestworker approach relied heavily on short-term permits (the saisonnier system), typically allowing stays of up to nine months tied to specific jobs. While Italians were the largest group, the system also recruited from other countries with labor surpluses, including Spain. The program’s rules—especially limits on family reunification—shaped migrants’ daily lives and long-term choices.
By the late 1960s, foreigners formed a large part of Switzerland’s workforce, with Italians the biggest group among many categories of foreign workers. In 1967, a large majority of foreign workers counted in the seasonal-worker statistics were Italian. These figures illustrate how central Italian labor was to Swiss construction, hospitality, and other sectors.
Switzerland moved from employer-level limits toward broader national control. In 1970, the federal government introduced a global quota that set an upper limit on the number of new foreigners allowed to enter. This policy shift reflected political pressure and signaled that labor recruitment would be more tightly managed.
Rising concern about “over-foreignization” led to a high-profile proposal to sharply cap the foreign share of the population. In a nationwide vote on June 7, 1970, the initiative was rejected, but it gained substantial support and intensified pressure for tighter policies. The campaign targeted the visible presence of labor migrants, especially those in guestworker roles.
After the 1973 energy and economic crisis, West Germany halted the recruitment of foreign workers from recruitment countries. The government order on November 23, 1973 ended a major phase of state-organized labor recruitment that had brought many Italians and Spaniards to German factories. The stop changed migration patterns by reducing new arrivals and increasing the importance of workers already in the country.
In 1974, West German policy statements emphasized keeping the recruitment ban in place and prioritizing jobs for unemployed Germans, while also noting that legally employed foreign workers should not be forced to leave. This reinforced a new policy direction: limiting new labor inflows while managing the long-term presence of existing migrant workers. It marked a clear turning point from recruitment to regulation and settlement-related issues.
A second major anti-immigration proposal in Switzerland—aimed at “foreign infiltration and overpopulation”—went to a national vote in 1974 and was rejected. Although it failed, repeated votes kept migration control at the center of Swiss politics during a period of economic slowdown. These political pressures influenced how guestworker programs evolved and how migrant communities were perceived.
By the mid-1970s, the central phase of postwar labor recruitment had largely closed, especially after West Germany’s recruitment stop and Switzerland’s tightening quotas. Even though these systems were often designed around temporary stays, many Italian and Spanish workers had built lives, workplaces, and communities in both countries. The period from 1950 to 1975 thus ended with a durable social change: large migrant-origin populations became a permanent part of Swiss and West German society.
Italian and Spanish labor migration to Switzerland and West Germany (1950–1975)