EDI (Inneres) EDA (Äußeres) EJPD (Justiz/Polizei) VBS (Verteidigung) WBF (Wirtschaft) EFV (Finanzen) UVEK (Umwelt, Verkehr, Energie)
Executive summary
Switzerland’s federal executive is organised into seven departments—each led by a Federal Councillor—and a small Federal Chancellery acting as an eighth unit; the departments include Inneres (EDI), Äußeres/Foreign Affairs (FDFA), Justice/Police (EJPD), Defence (VBS/DDPS), Economic Affairs (WBF/EAER), Finance (EFV/FDF) and Environment/Transport/Energy (UVEK/DETEC) as reflected in official listings of departments and councillors [1] [2]. The Federal Council collectively directs the administration but gives departments wide autonomy—Switzerland is often described as “seven co‑existing departmental governments” [1].
1. Federal departments: what the names in your query map to
The seven core federal departments are the organisational units you named in German abbreviations: EDI corresponds to the Federal Department of Home Affairs, the foreign affairs portfolio is handled by the FDFA (Äußeres), EJPD is the Federal Department of Justice and Police, VBS (also referred to as DDPS) covers defence, WBF/EAER is Economic Affairs, Education and Research, EFV/FDF is the Federal Finance Administration/Department of Finance, and UVEK/DETEC groups environment, transport, energy and communications; these mappings are the basic structure of the federal administration [1] [3] [2].
2. How leadership works: seven councillors, rotating presidency
Seven Federal Councillors form the Federal Council and each heads one department; the presidency rotates annually and confers primus inter pares status, not extra executive power. The administration is small relative to other states and the Federal Chancellery functions operationally as an eighth department while the Council collectively acts as head of state in corpore [4] [1] [2].
3. Departmental autonomy: not a single hierarchical government
Swiss practice gives substantial autonomy to departments: scholars and official descriptions characterise the executive as departmentalist—effectively seven co‑existing governments—because the Council lacks a hierarchical chief and departments execute laws and develop proposals for the Council and Parliament [1]. That autonomy explains why policy coordination often relies on negotiation and the Chancellery’s coordinating role [1].
4. Who currently heads the departments (context from 2025 lists)
Public listings of Federal Councillors name individuals and their department responsibilities: for example, Albert Rösti heads the department covering environment, transport, energy and communications (DETEC) and Karin Keller‑Sutter was President for 2025 while holding the Finance portfolio; other councillors and their first election dates are publicly listed on the government pages and encyclopedia summaries [2] [5] [6].
5. Institutional resources and official terminology
The federal administration maintains authoritative resources such as TERMDAT—a multilingual terminology database—for official designations, titles and abbreviations; that is the source for standardised department names and protected short forms used across languages [7]. The Federal Chancellery compiles public information portals (ch.ch) and the government website lists departments and councillors [8] [9].
6. When departments change hands or get redistributed
The Federal Council decides how departments are distributed among its members and may reassign portfolios; the practice of redistributing depends on seniority and internal Council decisions rather than external appointment processes [10]. The Council also elects the president annually from among its members [4] [10].
7. Practical implications for policy and accountability
Because the administration is split into seven largely autonomous departments, policy initiatives often reflect the priorities and culture of the responsible department as much as Council‑level strategy; parliamentary oversight remains the principal democratic control mechanism and the Federal Finance Administration evaluates departmental expenditure and the budget [1] [11].
Limitations and unread areas: available sources do not mention detailed duties of each department in your shorthand list beyond broad portfolios; they also do not provide a one‑to‑one table showing the exact German abbreviations you used matched to every current department acronym in the same source. The summaries above rely on the government and encyclopedia pages provided [1] [8] [2] [5].