[1] It comprises the following municipalities: The blazon of the municipal coat of arms abd flag is Or, issuant from coupeaux Vert an Oak-tree proper leaved and fructed of the second.

[1] In 2000, most of the population spoke French (29,275 or 87.7%) as their first language; German was the second most common (874 or 2.6%) and Italian was the third (808 or 2.4%).

[4][6] The historical population is given in the following chart:[7] In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the CVP which received 32.18% of the vote.

In the federal election, a total of 11,622 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 49.3%.

[9] In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election a total of 11,250 votes were cast, of which 995 or about 8.8% were invalid.

[10] From the 2000 census[update], 23,500 or 70.4% were Roman Catholic, while 3,958 or 11.9% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church.