The Quartz Crisis and Political Turmoil A Revolution in Timekeeping

The 1970s brought the watch world to its knees. In this episode, we explore how quartz technology—born from Cold War labs and Japanese innovation—shook the Swiss watch industry to its core. But it wasn’t just a tech revolution; it was a political and economic reckoning. We unpack the global fallout, Switzerland’s strategic response, and how this “crisis” reshaped not only watches, but also the global power dynamics of horology.