Matthias
I think the point about my position on Haider are certainly not
intended to play down the danger that he does represent. His
policies and ideas are as reprehensible to me as they are to the
next person. I welcome the fact that there have been mass
mobilisations against him and am of course worried about what his
policies, and the fact that he won't take a government post himself,
augur for the future.
As to the point about the formation of the coalition, well all sorts of
coalitions are formed only after elections and against the
proclamations of various parties made before them. The fact that
70% of Austrians voted for parties who said they wouldn't do a deal
woth the FPO and then in fact did so shows up one of the
fundamental weakness of representative democracy based on
infrequent elections. The "will of the voters" is something which is
often ignored by governments of all hues mainly because they can
get a way with it.
It is true that the Greens have traditionally captured the protest vote
against proporz and in the last Euro elections, for example, both
they AND the FPO increased their support largely for this reason.
The statistics show however, that there were very different social
bases to those voting blocs. The Greens picking up the middle
class, young and female voters, the FPO gaining 50% of the male
working class vote (47% at last year's election). That is what has
changed. The challenge to proporz is now coming from the
traditional working class base of social democracy. The reality of it
is that it is precisely these groups of people who DO feel
threatened in their job security and who tend, not just in Austria, to
turn to xenophobic and authoritarian parties. They do so, however,
only when their traditional party lets them down. The fault therefore
lies not with some charismatic Hitlerite rhetoric coming from Haider
but in the complete inability of the SPO to do anything to protect
its voting base.
As Matthias says, this is not, however, fascism. The solution to
the problem of the possible developments of the FPO and its
influence on government is therefore not merely one of demos
against him - welcome though they are - but also mobilisation
within and pressure upon the SPO to bring their young, male,
working class voters back into the fold.
Peter Thompson
Germanic Studies
University of Sheffield
Sheffield S10 2TN
Tel 0114 222 4907
Fax 0114 222 2160
http://www.shef.ac.uk/uni/academic/D-H/gs/
Also available on [log in to unmask]
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