How did Austria’s far right win its first national election since World War II?

Drawing on anxieties about immigration, inflation, and Ukraine, the Freedom Party finished ahead of the governing conservatives on Sept. 29. Rivals say they won’t work with party leader Herbert Kickl, who needs a parliamentary majority to become chancellor. 

|
Andreea Alexandru/AP
Herbert Kickl, leader of the Freedom Party of Austria waves to supporters, in Vienna, on Sept. 29, 2024, after polls closed in the country's national election.

The Freedom Party secured the first far-right national parliamentary election victory in post-World War II Austria on Sept. 29, finishing ahead of the governing conservatives after tapping into anxieties about immigration, inflation, Ukraine, and other issues. But its chances of governing were unclear.

Preliminary official results showed the Freedom Party finishing first with 29.2% of the vote and Chancellor Karl Nehammer’s Austrian People’s Party was second with 26.5%. The center-left Social Democrats were in third place with 21%. The outgoing government – a coalition of Mr. Nehammer’s party and the environmentalist Greens – lost its majority in the lower house of parliament.

Herbert Kickl, a former interior minister and longtime campaign strategist who has led the Freedom Party since 2021, wants to be chancellor.

But to become Austria’s new leader, he would need a coalition partner to command a parliamentary majority. Rivals have said they won’t work with Mr. Kickl in government.

The far right has benefited from frustration over high inflation, the war in Ukraine, and the COVID-19 pandemic. It has also built on worries about migration.

In its election program, titled “Fortress Austria,” the Freedom Party calls for “remigration of uninvited foreigners,” for achieving a more “homogeneous” nation by tightly controlling borders and suspending the right to asylum via an emergency law.

The Freedom Party also calls for an end to sanctions against Russia, is highly critical of Western military aid to Ukraine, and wants to bow out of the European Sky Shield Initiative, a missile defense project launched by Germany. Mr. Kickl has criticized “elites” in Brussels and called for some powers to be brought back from the European Union to Austria.

“We don’t need to change our position, because we have always said that we’re ready to lead a government, we’re ready to push forward this change in Austria side by side with the people,” Mr. Kickl said in an appearance alongside other party leaders on ORF public television. “The other parties should ask themselves where they stand on democracy,” he added, arguing that they should “sleep on the result.”

Mr. Nehammer said it was “bitter” that his party missed out on first place, but noted he brought it back from lower poll ratings. He has often said he won’t form a coalition with Mr. Kickl and said that “what I said before the election, I also say after the election.”

More than 6.3 million people were eligible to vote for the new parliament in Austria, an EU member that has a policy of military neutrality.

Mr. Kickl has achieved a turnaround since Austria’s last parliamentary election in 2019. In June, the Freedom Party narrowly won a nationwide vote for the first time in the European Parliament election, which also brought gains for other European far-right parties.

Dutch far-right leader Geert Wilders, whose party dominates the Netherlands’ new government, congratulated the Freedom Party on social network X on Sept. 19. So did Alice Weidel, a co-leader of the Alternative for Germany party.

The Freedom Party is a long-established force but the result on Sept. 29 was its best yet in a national parliamentary election, beating the 26.9% it scored in 1999.

In 2019, its support slumped to 16.2% after a scandal brought down a government in which it was the junior partner. Then-vice chancellor and Freedom Party leader Heinz-Christian Strache resigned following the publication of a secretly recorded video in which he appeared to offer favors to a purported Russian investor.

The leader of the Social Democrats, a party that led many of Austria’s post-World War II governments, positioned himself as the polar opposite to Mr. Kickl. Andreas Babler ruled out governing with the far right and labeled Mr. Kickl “a threat to democracy.”

While the Freedom Party has recovered, the popularity of Mr. Nehammer’s People’s Party declined sharply compared with 2019. Support for the Greens, their coalition partner, also dropped to 8%.

During the election campaign, Mr. Nehammer portrayed his party, which has taken a tough line on immigration in recent years, as “the strong center” that would guarantee stability amid multiple crises.

But crises ranging from the COVID-19 pandemic to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and resulting rising energy prices and inflation also cost it support. The government also angered many Austrians in 2022 with a short-lived coronavirus vaccine mandate, the first in Europe.

But the recent flooding caused by Storm Boris that hit Austria and other countries may have helped Mr. Nehammer slightly narrow the gap as a crisis manager.

The People’s Party is the far right’s only way into government and now holds the key to forming any administration.

Mr. Nehammer repeatedly excluded joining a government led by Mr. Kickl, describing him as a “security risk” for the country but didn’t rule out a coalition with the Freedom Party itself – which would imply Mr. Kickl renouncing a position in government. But that looks very unlikely with the Freedom Party in the first place.

The alternative would be an alliance between the People’s Party and the Social Democrats – with or without the liberal Neos, who took 9% of the vote.

A final official result will be published later in the week after a small number of remaining postal ballots have been counted, but those won’t change the outcome substantially.

About 300 protesters gathered outside the parliament building in Vienna on the evening of Sept. 29, holding placards with slogans including “Kickl is a Nazi.”

This story was reported by The Associated Press. AP writers Philipp Jenne, Pietro De Cristofaro, David Keyton, and Geir Moulson contributed to this report.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to How did Austria’s far right win its first national election since World War II?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2024/0930/Austria-far-right-election-victory-world-war-II
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe