Strengthen the migrant population – the city of Bern wants more migrants in the administration – News

Bern wants to take better account of the diversity of the population and is therefore striving for more diversity in the administration.

Almost every fourth person living in the city of Bern does not have a Swiss passport. In 2020, people from 162 different nations lived in the federal city, according to figures from the Bern Statistics Office.

The municipal council has now presented a “priority plan for migration and racism”. 25 goals are to be implemented by 2025. One of them: More people with a migration background in the urban workforce.

«The administration of the city of Bern should reflect the population of the city. That is not the case at the moment, »says the green social director Franziska Teuscher. The administration should act as a role model. They therefore want to give more weight to the topic of diversity in the training and management courses.

“If you find out that you don’t have anyone with a migration background in school social work, for example, although there are many children with this background in school, you should look for and hire a person with this profile,” says Teuscher.

Qualification is the focus

However, one will not hire someone just because he or she has a migration background, qualifications are key, adds Franziska Teuscher.

This practice is already being used by the cultural commissions of the city of Bern. In some cases, people with a migration background are specifically sought, says Franziska Burkhardt, head of culture in the city of Bern. She gives an example: “We were looking for a male literary scholar or cultural journalist with migration experience.” That’s exactly what they advertised and a suitable person was found.

We were looking for a male literary scholar or cultural journalist with migration experience.

It also helped that such specific tenders were quickly disseminated in the relevant networks.

The city administration hasn’t gotten that far yet. In order to ensure that the municipal workforce is more diverse, a corresponding HR strategy is to be developed and implemented in the coming years.