It was once considered a model of what is commonly known as “party discipline” – in a good and bad sense alike. That there are still remnants of it in the SPÖ today, especially following the bitter internal party dispute of the past few days, is almost a little surprising. The fact that the Burgenland governor Hans Peter Doskozil did not show up in the ZiB2 studio on Wednesday evening, contrary to rumors to the contrary, that he was obviously keeping to a provisional vow of silence previously agreed in the SPÖ party committees – one might hardly believe it.
