Abstract: The Swiss Concept of Dam Safety emerged in the beginning of the 1980's and, since then, was continuously and pragmatically improved to become the Swiss Model of Dam Safety. Switzerland plays a leading role in the definition of international recommendation in matter of dam safety, in the frame of various technical committees of the international Commission on Large Dams. The 4-level dam surveillance model in the Swiss Concept of Dam Safety is well structured to ensure dam safety. It facilitates surveillance operation with the defined procedures and clear roles and responsibilities.This paper introduces the Swiss Model of Dam Surveillance including the fundamental principles, tasks, procedures, organizations, partition of tasks and required qualifications of the involved operators and engineers.