(This article was written by Derk Jan Eppink and appeared in Wynia’s Week. Krijgt Oostenrijk dan toch een ‘Volkskanzler’?)
Herbert Kickl (56), leader of the Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs (FPÖ), stands on the threshold of the Bundeskanzleramt in Vienna. He was given the assignment of forming a new Austrian government by President Alexander van der Bellen (80), a Green no less. Austria is going through what the Netherlands went through last year. And for the third time at that.
In the parliamentary elections of 29 September last year, the FPÖ became the largest party in Austria for the first time. Christian Democrats (ÖVP), Socialists (SPÖ) and Liberals (NEOS, in full ‘Das Neue Österreich’) sat down at the table together to keep the ‘Freiheitlichen’ outside the door. After three months it blew up behind closed doors so violently that the formation attempt failed. The Liberals walked away angry because the economic reforms were ‘too thin’. Hard measures were needed, because Austria is exceeding the budget deficit of 3 percent, the European norm. With Socialists, cutting spending is difficult. Christian Democrats and Liberals have a majority of one seat in the Austrian parliament. ‘Unworkable’, they concluded. President Van der Bellen had to knock on the door of the man they all wanted to avoid: Herbert Kickl.
In the Netherlands the PVV became the largest party in 2023. But Geert Wilders did not become prime minister, because a government at arm’s length had to be formed, with the parliamentary group leaders as the school board. Austria does not work that way. Kickl got the bone on his plate and he intends to strip it. Van der Bellen, who hates Kickl and his FPÖ, had no other option. The ÖVP, the only partner that qualifies, faces the same impasse the CDA faced in 2010. The party is internally torn, but the situation is more hopeless than on the previous occasions, in 2000 and 2017. The ÖVP was the largest then and called the shots over its junior partner, the FPÖ.
The roles are now reversed. Kickl read the ÖVP the riot act: ‘No games, no tricks, no sabotage and no obstruction. Otherwise there will be new elections and we are ready for them.’ ‘Neuwahlen’ are a nightmare for the Christian Democrats, because according to opinion polls the FPÖ would grow even larger and the ÖVP shrink even further.
In 2000 the ÖVP, with Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel, was still lord and master. The FPÖ, then led by Jörg Haider, had to bow. He himself took no seat in the government. He bombarded it from the outside, quarrelled at home and eventually left his party to found a new one. In 2008 he was killed in a car crash, heavily under the influence. Politically speaking, Haider was an eternal adolescent. Because of the split, the FPÖ sank in the polls. Although Kickl, like Haider, came from Carinthia and was his pupil, he did not follow the ‘Obmann’ in his split.
In 2017 the FPÖ grew like wildfire again because of the migration crisis. The party, by then led by Heinz-Christian Strache, was needed once more. This time it was the young ÖVP politician and chancellor candidate Sebastian Kurz (38) who came knocking. It clicked with Vice-Chancellor Strache, and Kickl became interior minister. In 2019 Strache’s career went into a nosedive because of the Ibiza video, which, and the timing was good, had been secretly recorded two years earlier. The party leader, then still in opposition, discussed proposals with a woman who presented herself as the niece of a Russian oligarch. It concerned a ‘deal’ cum ‘dirty trick’ not unusual in Austria, whereby government contracts are awarded in exchange for positive publicity. Strache resigned, Kickl was dismissed on the spot by Kurz, and after that the remaining FPÖ ministers left as well. The party fell into a deep hole again.
The new leader of the FPÖ became… Herbert Kickl. At first sight not a charismatic figure. A small build, and too ascetic for a party where the beer flows abundantly, as in the bygone days of the ‘Burschenschaften’, student associations with a national-conservative character.
Kickl rebuilt the party from the ruins, and received a gift while doing so: covid. He painted government policy, including vaccinations and lockdowns, as an ‘attack on freedom’. He presented himself as the future ‘Volkskanzler’, which immediately set off alarm bells among opponents. Was there not also that other Austrian, A. Hitler, who once proclaimed the same? Kickl said he wanted to present himself as the chancellor ‘für den kleinen Mann’, in order to protect him against ‘Staatsgewalt’ and against the immigrating outside world. Austria was to become ‘eine Festung’. Kickl himself does not come across as a tribune of the people. He speaks with sharp formulations, purposefully and in a calm tone. No blustering torrent of words.
After the swearing in of those elected, the Austrian parliament became a bastion of the FPÖ, which supplied the speaker in Walter Rosenkranz, the highest office of the Republic after the president. With 57 members, of whom 13 women, the FPÖ group became the largest. Rosenkranz struck at once with his first foreign guest: Viktor Orbán, the prime minister of Hungary. As if the Austro-Hungarian dual monarchy (1867-1918) were making its re-entry. The speaker had the European flag removed from the reception salon and invited no parliamentary groups other than the FPÖ. I cannot see Dutch parliamentary speaker Martin Bosma pulling such stunts any time soon.
Relations changed not only domestically, with the FPÖ as the largest party, but abroad as well. There are now numerous right-wing governments, in various versions (the Netherlands, Italy, Sweden), while in France and Germany the front women Marine Le Pen and Alice Weidel are hammering on the gates of power.
It has become far more difficult for the European Commission and the European Parliament, in which the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) form the third group, to nail Austria to the cross as they did in 2000 and 2017. Among European heads of government, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is the Madonna of conservative Europe. Whoever offends her gets it back in a double portion. Just ask French President Emmanuel Macron.
The most pressing theme in the negotiations in Vienna is indeed European: the budget rules, in particular the 3 percent norm for the budget deficit. Before the elections the government said the deficit was 2.8 percent, but shortly afterwards it turned out to be 4 percent! That meant 18 billion in extra cuts. The liberal NEOS wanted hard measures; the Socialists dug in their heels and the ÖVP looked toward the FPÖ. So Kickl, as formateur, gets the 18 billion euro invoice pushed under his nose. FPÖ and ÖVP have already agreed to cut 6.3 billion euros in order to avert a so-called ‘excessive deficit procedure’ by the European Commission, and with it a downgrade of Austrian creditworthiness on the financial markets.
The negotiations with the FPÖ are reminiscent of those with the PVV. The first thing the FPÖ heard from ÖVP negotiator Christian Stocker: ‘Ein Öxit kommt nicht in Frage’. Öxit is the Austrian variant of Brexit and Nexit. Kickl may voice criticism, but there is a hard limit.
The FPÖ criticises sanctions against Russia and, like the PVV, will have to change course. Vienna of course hopes the blessing will come from elsewhere: a peace settlement via Donald Trump. And a ‘Bundeskanzler Kickl’ will have to abide by the rule of law. In short: constitutionality, à la Pieter Omtzigt. Remarkable: immigration is barely a point of contention, except that the ÖVP uses a different vocabulary. Most important: will the ‘Kickl mayonnaise’ set, as far as mutual trust is concerned?
That is relevant, because in December an old acquaintance suddenly appeared on the German ARD talk show of Sandra Maischberger: Sebastian Kurz. He said he was happy in business, but ruled nothing out. Admittedly he has meanwhile received a suspended sentence of eight months in prison for making false statements. A trial over the buying of newspaper advertisements in exchange for positive opinion polls, along the lines of the Strache method, is still running.
Kurz and Kickl have buried the hatchet, they say, but if formateur Kickl fails and thereby provokes ‘Neuwahlen’, the ÖVP still has one vote-getting cannon standing ready: Sebastian Kurz!
Derk Jan Eppink is a Distinguished Fellow (Honorary) at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C.-based foreign policy and defense think tank.
