The Financial Times has a story on the work and recent death of Jean-François Bergier, a Swiss economic historian who chaired an international commission that examined Switzerland’s policies in World War II. Calling himself a “conservative patriot,” Bergier apparently believed that the highest patriotic duty is to help one’s nation understand itself, looking at both lights and shadows.

The story of how he came to chair the commission is fairly dramatic:

Revelations about the dormant Swiss bank accounts of Holocaust victims and the stonewalling that greeted the efforts of relatives to gain access drew such stinging international criticism that in December 1996 Switzerland set up an international commission of experts to examine the country’s wartime role. Bergier was roused from his bed late at night by a call from officials in Bern and asked to take on the job of chairing it. He was given quarter of an hour to make up his mind — and agreed….

Backed by a staff of about 100, the commission, which reported in March 2002, went well beyond the initial question of relations with Nazi Germany. In 25 volumes and almost 11,500 pages, Bergier and his colleagues delved much deeper, encompassing the Swiss government’s approach to the thousands of Jews seeking entry to escape Nazi oppression.

Among other issues, the commission examined Switzerland’s wartime immigration policy — a topic relevant to the Swiss minaret ban controversy, since most Swiss Muslims are refugees from the former Yugoslavia:

Immigration was an acutely sensitive issue just before and during the war, with Bern intensely aware of the risks of provoking the Nazis. Some Allied countries, let alone nonbelligerents, hardly extended a warm welcome to Jewish refugees. But the commission concluded that Bern, tainted by anti-Semitism, could have done much more and was aware of the fate of those turned away — “needlessly” as Bergier stated.

The article concludes by discussing the timing of Bergier’s death with the vote on the minaret ban:

In that respect, it was oddly timely that Bergier’s death, shortly before his 78th birthday, should have come only weeks before Switzerland once again made international headlines after a surprise referendum decision backing a constitutional ban on minarets.

Switzerland justifiably highlights its long and noble humanitarian tradition, from the efforts of Henri Dunant and the founding of the Red Cross, to its subsequent willingness to take in wartime orphans or victims of aggression. Most recently, during the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s, the country opened its doors to thousands of refugees.

Yet the minaret vote — like previous, less successful attempts by ultraconservative populists to exploit xenophobia — spotlighted a continuing darker side to Swiss society, in spite of all its acknowledged democratic merits.

Bergier’s views about the ultranationalist Swiss People’s party and its effective, if frequently distorted, use of data to sway opinion, are not recorded. The consummate historian would presumably have pleaded for a more sober assessment of the evidence before voters jumped to any intemperate conclusions.

The article also notes that Bergier’s father was a Swiss pastor who had worked in Italy, but returned to Switzerland with the advent of Italian fascism. Perhaps his childhood exposure to a combination of Christian spirituality and his family’s experience with fascism prepared him to take a prophetic stance. Bergier does not seem to have been an activist by nature, and the article states that his work gained him the enmity of some politicians.

Requiescat in pace.