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September 29, 2024 - 7:30pm
In Austria, it has become almost natural law since the first post-war elections that either the conservative People’s Party (ÖVP) or the Social Democratic Party (SPÖ) win the federal elections. With a few exceptions, these parties tend to form coalition governments, making Austria a de facto two-party state that is either governed slightly centre-right or slightly centre-left.
But tonight, this law came to an end: the hard-Right Freedom Party (FPÖ) made history, coming in first with over 29% of the vote, followed by the ÖVP with 26%, while the Social Democrats continued their slow descent into irrelevance with 21%.
Since it is unlikely that anyone will enter into a shared government with the FPÖ, it looks like the Conservatives and the Socialists will either be joined by the Greens or the Liberals — both of which remained below 10% in the election — creating another first in Austrian history: a coalition government of more than two parties. The FPÖ finds itself in a similar situation to the AfD in Germany, where despite growing popularity with voters, the likelihood of being in government is getting ever smaller.
The other parties accuse the FPÖ of pandering to conspiracy theories and being too soft on Vladimir Putin — an accusation that is not entirely without merit. The party has, for example, suggested fixing holes in the budget by cancelling support for Ukraine. But even so, it is not clear whether this position hurt them with the voters.
Overall, the FPÖ’s success can best be explained by three factors. The first is migration. As an unapologetically nationalist party that does not shy away from discussing “remigration”, the party always had a strong base among those who prefer closed borders. Secondly, the Covid policies of the Conservative-Green coalition that has run the government since 2019 were some of the strictest measures in Europe. In response, the FPÖ, under its leader, Herbert Kickl, quickly seized the opportunity to become the most vocal critic of these policies. Although for many people, Covid is a faint memory, some of the most vocal opponents of the pandemic policies likely became staunch supporters of the FPÖ. And finally, voter mobilisation: with almost 80% voter turnout, it seems plausible that previous non-voters also switched to the FPÖ.
It remains to be seen whether excluding the strongest party in parliament from governing will weaken the FPÖ, but one thing is clear: there is growing frustration with the status quo across the country. Indeed, six out of 10 Austrians feel dissatisfied with the direction of the country. Freezing the FPÖ out of office could drive this number up.
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SubscribeThe Hard right = anyone with a sane immigration policy
How is cancelling “support” for Ukraine being “soft on Putin” – “support” for Ukraine in reality is not support for Ukraine, but for the continuation of a hopeless proxy war where Ukraine and Ukrainians are being sacrificed for unattainable US war aims.
At this point, Russia has not yet achieved its war aims, i.e. control of the entirety of the four oblasts it accepted into the Russian Federation in September 2022. The most difficult dilemma for Russia right now would be a genuine push for negotiations, where Russia would be pressured by its BRICS friends to show good will, and so become entrapped in settling for the line of control. With Ukraine continuing to be intransigent, with European and US support for that intransigence, Russia is under no pressure and can continue its war.
‘How is cancelling “support” for Ukraine being “soft on Putin” – “support” for Ukraine in reality is not support for Ukraine, but for the continuation of a hopeless proxy war where Ukraine and Ukrainians are being sacrificed for unattainable US war aims’
‘Russia is under no pressure and can continue its war.’
If both those statements are true then I’m afraid pulling their support would be soft on putin. America and the EU cannot on one hand commit to a proxy war then on the other remove support when ‘Russia is under no pressure and can continue’.
That would be a serious betrayal of the Ukrainians that America and the EU said they would support.
Regardless of the causes (which are useful only really to discuss when thinking of how negotiations might look), America and the EU should not have committed support unless they were willing to carry that support on right through to the conclusion of the war.
“support” for Ukraine in reality is not support for Ukraine’
Yes it is.
You turn my argument on its head.
Where I agree with you is this:
Quite. But that is precisely what is happening. The West has dumped all its military surplus in Ukraine, but now that’s all gone. The cupboard is bare. It is time to cut Ukraine loose.
It is what the US always does, as Vietnamese, Cambodians, Laotians, Syrians, Kurds, Iraqis, Afghans etc. etc. can attest.
The point I was making is that so long as the US and the EU “support” Ukraine, Russia is under no pressure and can continue its war. The way to put pressure on Russia is to engage in negotiations.
Russia is being pressured by Brazil, India and other BRICS nations to negotiate. Russia keeps on repeating that she is open to negotiations, secure in the knowledge that Ukraine will not countenance negotiations, so Russia need not fear being called on its “willing to negotiate” rhetoric. Ukraine’s intransigence allows Russia to tell its BRICS friends: “See? There is no point to negotiations.”
‘Quite. But that is precisely what is happening. The West has dumped all its military surplus in Ukraine, but now that’s all gone. The cupboard is bare. It is time to cut Ukraine loose.
It is what the US always does, as Vietnamese, Cambodians, Laotians, Syrians, Kurds, Iraqis, Afghans etc. etc. can attest.’
Ukraine and the West have made an effort to increase ammunition production and drone production since then.
In my opinion, now we have said we will support them, we should support them. Frankly it’s not good enough to say the cupboard is bare – better get filling that cupboard. That really shouldn’t be a hard ask from the world’s largest military powers. To be able to provide the weapons they said they could provide. That’s my opinion. I can’t believe we can’t try harder than the cupboard is bare it’s time to cut them loose. You cannot just cut loose in a war. In my opinion.
‘The point I was making is that so long as the US and the EU “support” Ukraine, Russia is under no pressure and can continue its war. The way to put pressure on Russia is to engage in negotiations’
So your grand plan would be to cut weapons supplies so putin negotiates?
Why would he not continue his offensive instead? Especially if you are going to take the weapons from the army he is fighting? Surely that’s ridiculous?
Russia is being pressured by Brazil, India and other BRICS nations to negotiate. Russia keeps on repeating that she is open to negotiations, secure in the knowledge that Ukraine will not countenance negotiations, so Russia need not fear being called on its “willing to negotiate” rhetoric. Ukraine’s intransigence allows Russia to tell its BRICS friends: “See? There is no point to negotiations.”’
Jolly good, I’m glad there is a push for a diplomatic solution. Ukraine has recently said it will hold a peace summit to which Russia is invited I believe? So ukraine isn’t exactly being awkward either is it?
There are several attitudinal preconceptions underlying your post that need adjusting:
You assume that Western economies are still industrial, manufacturing powers. We’re not. We’ve deliberately deindustrialised, moving our heavy industry and manufacturing offshore, and basing our economies on services and financialisation. The last major industrial power of the West, Germany, has been deliberately kneecapped, to the glee of US Neocons and German Greens. So about the West being able to churn out weapons and ammunition – dream on.
You also completely miss the power of diplomacy. Unsurprisingly, since the West has abandoned diplomacy entirely. Setting out ultimatums is not diplomacy. Screeching “sanctions” with the wild abandon of Alice in Wonderland’s Queen of Hearts is not diplomacy. Negotiating treaties in bad faith is not diplomacy. Informing the side winning on the battlefield of the terms of surrender expected of it is not diplomacy. But the rest of the world practices diplomacy and appreciates its power.
The West has the conceit that the world revolves around us. No longer.
‘You assume that Western economies are still industrial, manufacturing powers’
No I do not, I have spent considerable time drawing attention to that fact and have even suggested dropping net zero in favour of a war economy to make up for our short fall in manufacturing.
‘So about the West being able to churn out weapons and ammunition – dream on.’
I take it you aren’t British. We make the impossible, possible here. That’s very defeatist and not really a good enough answer.
‘You also completely miss the power of diplomacy’
No I do not. Again, I spent an enormous amount of time writing about why diplomacy was important last time there was a negotiation window. I have tonnes of comments on the subject, war and peace is shorter.
I noticed the Austrian representative at the un, around the same time I was writing last year, was actually very pro war and did not think diplomacy was a good idea. I can find the meeting if you would like to watch it. I take it Austria has changed its mind.
I would rather a diplomatic solution is found, cutting weapons supplies to achieve one though is surely questionable practice.
Unfortunately, any mule can kick down a barn, but it takes a carpenter to build one. Once industrial capacity is destroyed, it cannot be reactivated by pressing a button or throwing money at it. That is the Robert Habeck school of economics, and quite appropriately, Habeck’s genre is authoring children’s books.
Whether or not weapons supplies contributes to a diplomatic solution is a question of the overall plan. And that, to me, is sorely missing. The only “diplomatic solution” I’ve heard the West propound is focussed on Zelensky’s 10 Points. That’s a hiding to nothing.
To me, the European support for Ukraine has been a mix of the pointless, the self-serving, and the self-destructive. Regardless of whether effectively supporting Ukraine is the right thing to do, Europe has at no point gone about it in any way that is capable of achieving any genuine support of Ukraine.
To be clear, I also don’t think Europe has any realistic way of actually supporting Ukraine at this point. The only way Europe could have supported Ukraine is in pressuring Ukraine to implement the Minsk Accords. After all, by the EU’s acquis communautaire, Ukraine would have been obliged to implement the principles of the Minsk Accords as a precondition for joining.
The EU’s raison d’être had been to drown irredentism and revanchism in economic growth. The EU was able to overcome the enmity between France and Germany. We need another achievement at that level to achieve peace in Europe.
‘Unfortunately, any mule can kick down a barn, but it takes a carpenter to build one. Once industrial capacity is destroyed, it cannot be reactivated by pressing a button or throwing money at it. That is the Robert Habeck school of economics, and quite appropriately, Habeck’s genre is authoring children’s books’
Thank you, that’s rather rude, but really quite funny. I have actually been shouting about free trade and no war with China and no nato war too based on the fact we have off shored everything and reshoring in fact would be very expensive and actually quite difficult. It couldn’t be done without scrapping net zero and it would be an enormous effort. That isn’t to say it can’t be done though and American and European industries are in fact ‘de-risking’ by on shoring production already and have been for some time.
Your points are all well and good but none of that changes the situation as it is now.
‘Whether or not weapons supplies contributes to a diplomatic solution is a question of the overall plan.’
I agree with that, I don’t know myself what contribution that would make to a diplomatic solution, my opinion is that now America and the EU have committed, Ukraine needs economic and military support until a diplomatic solution is found, but I’m not saying I’m right.
I am not convinced that the US and Europe (i.e. the EU) “have committed”. They may say they have, but I very much doubt they have done so in full cognisance of what the term means, and if they did understand, they did not mean it, and have no intention of following through.
It seems to me that is the root of our disagreement.
The issue is further complicated by what I perceive is discrepancies between different fiefdoms within the US; there is quite evidently a fundamental disjunct between the State Department, the White House, and the Pentagon.
In Europe, a bizarre confluence of EU exponents and NATO – neither of whom have any military means or power whatsoever – have simulated a unity of commitment and purpose, which is not borne out by attitudes in the EU members (or by the only NATO member with any heft, the US). As is evident by election results across different EU countries.
Your whole comment is correct. But your final paragraph summarises the situation exactly.
The problem is that the West’s rulers don’t understand that…yet. They may when “the West” loses the proxy war with Russia…but unfortunately it’s more likely that they won’t.
https://unherd.com/newsroom/the-european-consensus-on-ukraine-is-shifting/
‘The growing consensus behind a realist approach was exemplified by Czech President Petr Pavel in a New York Times interview published this week. Pavel, a former Nato Military Committee Chairman, said “the most probable outcome of the war will be that a part of Ukrainian territory will be under Russian occupation, temporarily.” Both sides will need to make compromises; Pavel added that “to talk about a defeat of Ukraine or a defeat of Russia — it simply will not happen.”’
This. Sensible and pragmatic. It’s no good saying:’ They may when “the West” loses the proxy war with Russia…but unfortunately it’s more likely that they won’t’
What is your analysis based on?
Why is the obvious move not the OVP agreeing to support the FPO in exchange for continuing support for Ukraine/NATO. OVP could agree to support FPO on migration and remigration. I can’t believe the OVP’s voters want more Muslim immigrants.
So-called hard right populist parties are on the rise everywhere in western democracies. Maybe – just maybe – these clowns in the political and technocratic class should ask themselves why this is happening. And it ain’t just immigration.
However, reality is that majority of people in Europe still vote for parties which support policies leading to ethnic and cultural suicide for native majority.
If white people are too stupid to see it in sufficient numbers, well they deserve to die.
I think the only solution to immigration problem lies outside democracy and it will come within next 10 to 15 years.
The concept of remigration has support across a much broader section of the population than those who vote for the far right. Politicians from other parties just use other words because “remigration” got a bad rep after the Potsdam meeting, the hysteria around which was trumped up.
Olaf Scholz has been quoted as saying that Germany needs to “start deporting people in a big way/deporting large numbers of people” (“Abschiebungen im großen Stil”). Why the notion of large numbers of people being deported can’t be fairly described as remigration is unclear to me. As long as the word is limited to the removal of people who have/no longer have no right to be in the country, it is appropriate for general use in the context of a problem which a large part of the public rightly want solved.
I would say you are skirting around the issues here.
Deporting people illegally in the country should be no brainer for anyone who believes in society based on rule of law.
Remigration means removing people who might be legally here (on visa, residence permit etc) but who clearly don’t want to integrate and support enemies of the West like Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah.
I am personally for total ban on Muslim migration into the West and deportation of all extremist on security services watch lists and all the extreme mullahs.
If I see the lazy, overused term “Hard Right” (i.e. Far Right, Extreme Right, Super-Far Right, Really-Really Far Right, Ultra Far Right, Incredibly Far Right) and the like again ……..
The spectrum should be: Traditional Conservative (Reform), Progressive Conservative (the Tories), Progressive Liberals (Lib Dems), Progressives (Labour), Ultra-Progressive (Greens), Progressive Sectarian (SNP, PC), Non-Progressive Sectarians (Muslim parties).
My assumption is that the authors would really like to say n**i, but they have to go through the same moderation software as the BTL commentors, so go with the euphemism instead. It gets the article out quicker.
Were the n*zis really even right wing?
I thought they loved a bit of top down, state control, everything moderated by the state, very bossy. I thought they were socialists. Militant bossy socialists.
Hard right = basically anyone who holds views that 90pc of people in 1989 held.
Good article. Thanks Dr Schoelhammer. The article states that “The other parties accuse the FPÖ of pandering to conspiracy theories”. I have no idea about the validity of this accusation, but it would not be irrational of the FPÖ. Research suggests that more than half the population has at least one belief that is classified (by the experts) as a conspiracy theory. Furthermore, the proportion of those who believe conspiracy theories is higher amongst those who feel excluded from political influence. In a democracy, why shouldn’t a legal political party engage with this constituency? The FPÖ got 29% of the vote, i.e. about half the proportion of conspiracy theory believers in the general population according to research.
P.S. Only one of my beliefs, COVID lab leak, is dismissed by “experts” as a conspiracy theory. I classify lab leak under the heading of c0ck-up theory.
You’re on the right track. The FPÖ – and especially Kickl – was during the Covid Hysteria insisting on legal/constitutional process. This is now being called “conspiracy theorising”, even though such luminaries of the Received Narrative propaganda as Whitty and Drosten have admitted that it was nonsense.
It bears remembering that in Germany, holding up copies of the Grundgesetz (effectively the German constitution) was deemed subversive and merited brutal attacks by riot police hooligans.
It seems to me that the power is with the members of the traditional conservative parties throughout the continent – certainly in Germany, France and Austria.
Should they – the CDU, the Republicans/UMP and the OVP – come to see it as advantageous to ally with the “far right” party leading in the polls, Europe will indeed see a rightward shift.
It is all down to the members of those conservative parties that will ultimately make the call. Given that there are less than 300k members of the CDU, 70k of the UMP and an unknown but undoubtedly tiny number of OVP members, it would not take many people to radically shift European politics.
Here in the States the first two articles on the election that I saw both highlighted the Nazi links of the FPO…never bother to ask why people vote for them…just yell Nazi and move on
Another traffic light coalition beckons it seems. Such coalitions are well named because traffic lights are always stop-go locations.
The Academy, Corporate Media, and political parties have hijacked and corrupted the so-called “hard right,” conservatism, “right-wing nut jobs,” “radical right,” etc. All these terms are Classic Liberalism.
Classical liberalism is a leading political tradition that advocates free markets, laissez-faire economics, and civil liberties under the rule of law. Classical liberalism emphasizes individual autonomy, limited government, economic freedom, political freedom, and, importantly, freedom of speech.
Classical liberalism, contrary to defective liberal branches like social liberalism, looks negatively at indefensible social policies, gratuitous taxation, and deep state involvement in the lives of individuals.
Finally, Classical liberalism advocates sweeping deregulation, robust liberty, justice, and freedom for all.
Classic liberalism is anathema to all the declining left-wing parties, elite cosmopolitan globalists, and all the failed, mechanical “international institutions.”
‘Hard Right’. ‘Far Right’. Yawn. Too many decades of Far Left governance has corrupted post-WW2 democracies everywhere. The manipulation of ‘human rights’ to invert the law in favour of minorities is the principal weapon of destruction. The Woke Era is the consequence. The Woking Class is in control. We need a ‘far right’ revolution to revert to a more balanced, reasonable system of majority rule.