Editorial: What is Switzerland?

In around twenty years, South Korea has created an attractive image in the collective imagination. Without even having been there, everyone has a rather positive idea of ​​the country through its series, its gastronomy, its music.

Before South Korea, it was the charm of Japan that had worked. If sushi and ramen compete with American burgers and Italian pizzas, it is thanks to «soft power» nippon.

The soft power is a cultural influence strategy that propagates a seductive portrait of a country and its citizens. The idea being to give a simple answer to the question: What is Japan? What is South Korea?

And what is Switzerland? How are we Swiss perceived? General audience fiction, “Winter Palace” depicts a country of pioneers, brilliant entrepreneurs evolving in grandiose settings. A country of polyglots who, contrary to our reputation as being quiet and not very expansive, know how to receive.

It is often said that to be loved, you must learn to love yourself. “Winter Palace” not only makes us love ourselves a little more, but will, it is likely, succeed in making foreign viewers who discover the fiction on Netflix love Switzerland.

And after “Winter Palace”, how to keep this “good impression”? Switzerland comes eighth in the Global Soft Power Index 2024, which measures the influence of countries. The ranking particularly commends our economic stability and our good relations with other states. But the study notes that we could be more culturally influential, and that we would benefit from making our heritage better known.

However, what could be better than cinema to tell our beautiful stories? Our European neighbors have shown us how to attract filming by introducing economic incentives. It is now up to us to seize this opportunity and tell our story.

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