“Beautifully written and brilliantly researched, Swiss Maid not only reminds us of the powerful farmers, nurses, soldiers and entrepreneurs—mothers, sisters and daughters—who helped build a nation but also provides us with inspiring role models and hope for the future.”

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Iris Bohnet, Professor, Harvard Kennedy School, and author of What Works: Gender Equality By Design

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SWISS MAID: THE UNTOLD STORY OF WOMEN’S CONTRIBUTIONS TO SWITZERLAND’S SUCCESS is apt to correct the omission of women in historical narratives of Switzerland. There has been a pleasant amount of research done on the history of women in Switzerland since historians – mostly women historians – began to explore into women’s work, citizenship and nationality, political rights, family life and education. But the historical narratives of Switzerland have not been changed by their publications. What has been called the basis of Switzerland’s success, political stability, high quality of products, innovation, and financial success is still described as if women did not have any part in it, as if they did have not existed. Margrit Zinggeler’s consistent focus on women’s share, based on portraits of historical and contemporary women as well as historical data, and written in style and content for a wide range of readers, will change this and open our eyes for women’s contributions to the underlying factor of the Swiss hallmarks.

 

Regina Wecker, Professor of Women’s and Gender History, University of Basel, Switzerland.