> Instead of all cantons adopting one of the existing four as the universal language, they are now trying for English, it seems.
That’s likely deliberate and quite sensible, as elevating one of the existing four would probably cause disunity.
Something similar happened at the creation of the modern Indonesian state. Rather than elevating e.g. Javanese, they imported Malay as the neutral foundation of the Indonesian language.
Meanwhile, in Switzerland, Zürich is contemplating making school children study English before French/Italian. That's great, except Switzerland is already quad-lingual, depending on canton. Making it more difficult for a german-speaking person in Zürich to go to Geneva probably won't be great for unity. Instead of all cantons adopting one of the existing four as the universal language, they are now trying for English, it seems.
(As an immigrant observer.)