Since December 2021, Austria has been led by a coalition government of conservative ÖVP and environmentalists, headed by Chancellor (Prime Minister) Karl Nehammer (ÖVP). But the general elections to be held in a year might well favor the far-right FPÖ party, which has participated in several government coalitions over the past 25 years.
After several difficult years, this formation, which made headlines in the early 2000s under the rule of the charismatic Jörg Haïder, has just obtained a very encouraging score in the regional elections of the Land of Niederösterreich (Lower Austria), the largest of the country’s federated states and the second most populous following Vienna: with nearly 24% of the vote, i.e. 9.43 points more than in the 2018 elections, the FPÖ rose to second place behind the ÖVP (39.93%) but ahead of the SPÖ Social Democrats (20.65%).
Now led by Herbert Kickl, former Minister of the Interior (2017-2019), the FPÖ now aims to no longer just be a “junior partner” of the government coalition, but to win the next elections and place its leader to the post of chancellor, the latter exercising the reality of the executive power in the country.
A short desert crossing
Since the Ibiza Affair, which cost him his place in government in 2019, we thought the moribund FPÖ. A video shot in secret in 2017 on the Spanish island showed Heinz-Christian Strache, then party leader and vice-chancellor, saying he was ready, during a conversation with a Russian interlocutor, to align his training with the interests of Moscow in exchange for funding. In the process, Strache had resigned, but the chancellor at the time, Sebastian Kürz, had also dismissed Herbert Kickl, Minister of the Interior, leading to the departure of the FPÖ from the government.
The result recorded in Lower Austria demonstrates that the party remains a leading political force in the country.
If this election was marked by the revival of the FPÖ, it should also be noted that the ÖVP clearly fell back, losing a significant part of its voters precisely to the benefit of the FPÖ. The other lesson that can be drawn from this election relates to the choice of the head of the FPÖ list in the person of Udo Landbauer, a rising figure in the party, embodying its hardest wing.
Recall that the supporters of the hard wing are obsessed with dealing with so-called identity issues or those related to security, immigration and the “Diktat of the EU” while the moderates try to broaden the proposals of the FPÖ in economic, societal or even environmental fields. This split between the two lines has existed within the FPÖ since its creation, even if very often the hard wing has taken over the moderate wing.
Landbauer had already been talked regarding in 2018 when he found himself at the heart of a political affair which had forced him to give up all his mandates and to withdraw from the FPÖ. He had at the time refused to disavow a book, found in the premises of a student organization, which made the apology of Nazism and the Third Reich.
Its return to favor and its success in Lower Austria underline that the FPÖ, both regionally and nationally, is never as strong from an electoral point of view as when it leans towards the hardest wing. A political line acclaimed by Herbert Kickl.
Kickl, who does not hide his desire to be the next Austrian Chancellor following the 2024 elections, has other reasons for optimism: a January 2023 poll places the FPÖ by far in the lead, with 28% of voting intentions for the next legislative elections, ahead of the Social Democrats of the SPÖ (24%) and the Conservatives of the ÖVP, who won only 22% of the vote. If a poll remains what it is and the political truth of yesterday will not necessarily be that of tomorrow, no one can dispute the fact that the FPÖ is back on the front of the stage.
In addition, the poll also mentioned the choice of chancellor. The current Conservative Chancellor Karl Nehammer is still voted for by nearly 20% of those polled, but is closely followed by Herbert Kickl, who has the support of 17% of Austrians, far ahead of Pamela Rendi-Wagner, the president of the SPÖ, who does not obtains only 12% of voting intentions.
In view of this survey, and if we find ourselves in the same configuration following the 2024 legislative elections, we might be heading towards a new coalition between the ÖVP and the FPÖ. One year remains for the FPÖ and Herbert Kickl to capitalize on this success obtained in Lower Austria and once once more interfere in the duel between the ÖVP and the SPÖ. These elections had a particular taste for the FPÖ insofar as it was to confirm its revival observed for many weeks in the polls. The various elections taking place during the year 2023 will be just as essential to enable the party to approach the legislative elections of 2024 with strong momentum.
Positions that run counter to the Austrian consensus
On several major issues, the line defended by the FPÖ differs significantly from that of the other Austrian parties. On topics such as immigration or the notion of national identity, the party seems isolated on the national political scene, just as it is internationally with its constant euroscepticism.
During the Covid crisis, the FPÖ had opposed the wish of the Austrian government to make vaccination compulsory, believing that vaccination should come from a personal will and not from a government decision. In the media, the speakers of the FPÖ had made themselves the defenders of individual freedoms by criticizing the various measures put in place to stem the pandemic and by calling for demonstrations once morest confinement, to which the party was fiercely opposed.
From the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the members of the FPÖ pleaded, through the voice of Herbert Kickl, for Austria to mediate between Ukraine and Russia, recalling their attachment to Austrian neutrality (as a reminder, neutrality has been enshrined in the Constitution since the end of the Second World War and the country is for example not a member of NATO). Herbert Kickl took advantage of this moment to insist on the fact that sanctioning Russia would not resolve the conflict and was a form of “political naivety”. Moreover, while conceding that Russian actions in Ukraine were contrary to international law, he did not fail to question the will of NATO and the United States to “provoke the Russians”.
In November 2022, it was the turn of MP Petra Steger, daughter of former FPÖ leader Norbert Steger (Vice-Chancellor of Austria from 1983 to 1987), to protest once morest Vienna’s support for Kiev: “The government would rather finance the EU and Ukraine war than help the Austrians! The FPÖ also criticized Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen’s trip to Ukraine, Herbert Kickl even going so far as to call it “Staatsgefährder” (dangerous for the state), considering that this visit constituted a breach of Austrian neutrality , which, for him, was inconceivable. Finally, on March 30, the FPÖ deputies demonstrably left the Bundestag when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was giving a speech there.
This position has found an extension at European level, the FPÖ – which sits in the European Parliament within the Identity and Democracy group, alongside the Lega (Italy), Alternative for Germany (AfD), Vlaams Belang ( Belgium) or the Danish People’s Party, all parties known for their understanding attitude towards Moscow – clearly disapproving of the decisions of the European Commission favorable to Kiev. To quote FPÖ MEP Harald Vilimsky: “We are clearly opposed to the EU going into further debt to support Ukraine, a non-EU country). »
These positions of the FPÖ concerning the war in Ukraine can be explained in particular by the deep and old links which unite the party to Russia. In 2009, Heinz-Christian Strache, then president of the FPÖ, declared himself in favor of Russia’s entry into the EU and, more generally – without even mentioning the Ibiza affair – the FPÖ often defended the idea of a rapprochement and greater cooperation between Austria and Russia.
A decisive year
While many of its positions are controversial, both on the health crisis and on the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, the FPÖ hardly seems to suffer from it at the electoral level.
Better, it might be reborn from its ashes following a complicated period. Is the current good situation of the FPÖ not ultimately the result of the strategy of “radicality” put in place by its leader? After Jörg Haider and Heinz-Christian Strache, will Herbert Kickl be the “messiah” long awaited by his party and, for the first time in the history of the FPÖ, delight the chancellery?
In view of the political context in Austria, the FPÖ seems in a good position to at best win the chancellery for the first time or at least to become a coalition partner once more. Finally, one might say that the only adversary of the FPÖ is the FPÖ itself because, if in the coming year the party is not shaken by internal quarrels or a scandal such as the “Ibiza Affair”, strong it is to bet that he will return to power…
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By Benjamin Rojtman-Guiraud, PhD student in political science, University of Lorraine
The original version of this article was published on The Conversation.
