Vote in the Austrian Federal Election (for real this time!!)

[Josquius]

I checked who the tattoo guy I voted for is...and though from a silly party it seems he does speak a lot of sense.

[Syt]

Ok, to reveal:


Madeleine Petrovic, independent list. Used to be part of Greens, but during Corona went hard anti-vaxx and campaigned against Pfizer and Bill Gates.


Fayad Mulla, KEINE von denen (NONE of the above). Human rights activist; received a prize for uncovering illegal practices around pushing back migrants crossing the Mediterranean. Irrelevant protest party.


Andreas Babler, SPÖ. The social democrats have been struggling for a long time now. While their previous party chair, Rendi-Wagner, was quite competent (IMO) they've been struggling to engage with voters and their topics, and Babler has not improved that by much.


Dominik Wlazny, BIER. It started as a joke/satirical party (similar to Die Partei in Germany). However, they did gain some seats in local elections. Wlazny is a trained medical doctor and musician. For these elections the party (or rather: Wlazny - without him the party would immediately disappear, I think) they're trying to offer more of a "serious" program (generally left-ish and progressive), and I think they may have chance of getting into parliament by gaining protest votes from people who don't want to vote right-wing.


Tobias Schweiger, KPÖ. The Communists have in recent years had some surprise wins. E.g. the mayor of Graz, Austria's second largest city, is from the KPÖ - certainly helped by Graz being a major university city. That said, those successes come IMHO from the weakness of the SPÖ, with the KPÖ picking up topics that were usually covered by the SPÖ (social security, affordable housing/costs of living). Overall I'd classify the modern KPÖ as more social democrat that communist/socialist, but definietly on the left end of the Social Democrat spectrum. Of course the term "Communism" will still scare off many voters.


Werner Kogler, Greens. Vice chancellor in the current government. Overall the Greens struggle with disappointed voters. They implemented some of their goals, but they were the clearly weaker partner in the government with the conservatives and had to compromise on many things.


Beate Meinl-Reisinger, NEOS. A curious party, mostly classical liberals (or libertarians if you will). They mostly aim at reducing bureaucracy, regulations, state administration etc. Which is needed to some degree in Austria IMO. Not a big fan of their "Austrians don't work enough, so we need to make it more attractive to work overtime" agenda, deregulating the capital market, cutting back welfare to make sure "working pays off." They want to invest in eduction (much needed, IMO), though I did chuckle that they include in their program a point "Kein Kind zurücklassen" - No child left behind (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act).


Karl Nehammer, ÖVP. Current chancellor. IMO far better than Kurz was, but still fairly conservative - and, unsually, free of major scandals or allegations of corruption, which are often the bane of the major parties after decades in the halls of power. He did have a few mess ups, like when he said no kid in Austria has to be hungry or go without a warm meal because after all McDonalds sells burgers for 1.20, after all (which they don't anymore ). Clearly a "let's stay the course" party.


Herbert Kickl, FPÖ. Often ridiculed for his short stature, or his stubborn insistence on creating a horseback police unit during his time as Interior Minister, he has been the ideological brains of the FPÖ for a long time, while Strache and Hofer were the faces. He's not very popular in the population, but the FPÖ profits from a general malaise/discontent at the moment. Immigration is the big topic, but there's a general political unhappiness which seems common in many countries - things are changing, people are disoriented. They mostly pick up voters from ÖVP and SPÖ. And every time those parties try to co-opt topics from the FPÖ they lose votes to them. Their campaign has been less aggressive than usual, and if they get into power it's not likely the material situation of the "common folks" will improve much - they're quite business friendly with tendencies towards corruption; even more so than the other parties, IMO. But I think these days a lot of people don't necessary look at what's the bottom line on their bank account but how they feel about things. And if they make things worse for the "right" people, then their voters will, at least for a while, be quite happy. As said before, if Strache/Hofer were still in good graces, the FPÖ would look at an easy win in the elections, currently they're head to head with the ÖVP.

[Syt]

The Austrian Press Agency has an average of the major election polls since the last one on their site. Note: In Austria you need 4% to get into parliament.



Also, ÖVP have said they wouldn't form a government with the FPÖ, or with a chancellor Kickl.

However, ÖVP have not been reliably keeping such promises in the past, and I could see a small change in power within ÖVP and joining with the FPÖ again if it means they can stay in government.

[Admiral Yi]

Beate Meinl-Reisinger, NEOS. A curious party, mostly classical liberals (or libertarians if you will). They mostly aim at reducing bureaucracy, regulations, state administration etc. Which is needed to some degree in Austria IMO. Not a big fan of their "Austrians don't work enough, so we need to make it more attractive to work overtime" agenda, deregulating the capital market, cutting back welfare to make sure "working pays off." They want to invest in eduction (much needed, IMO), though I did chuckle that they include in their program a point "Kein Kind zurücklassen" - No child left behind (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act).

[Syt]

I was going to call them the Yi Party.

[Richard Hakluyt]

"Dominik Wlazny, BIER. It started as a joke/satirical party (similar to Die Partei in Germany). However, they did gain some seats in local elections. Wlazny is a trained medical doctor and musician. For these elections the party (or rather: Wlazny - without him the party would immediately disappear, I think) they're trying to offer more of a "serious" program (generally left-ish and progressive), and I think they may have chance of getting into parliament by gaining protest votes from people who don't want to vote right-wing."

I am also happy with my vote 

[Josquius]

"Dominik Wlazny, BIER. It started as a joke/satirical party (similar to Die Partei in Germany). However, they did gain some seats in local elections. Wlazny is a trained medical doctor and musician. For these elections the party (or rather: Wlazny - without him the party would immediately disappear, I think) they're trying to offer more of a "serious" program (generally left-ish and progressive), and I think they may have chance of getting into parliament by gaining protest votes from people who don't want to vote right-wing."

I am also happy with my vote 

Me too. I had a look at their website before hand and some of their little policies are quite great. I like the poster limitation.

I'm curious what exactly they're talking about with their land use stuff however. Its unclear.

https://www.bierpartei.eu/menu/

[Syt]

In Austria, about 13 hectars of natural soil are lost to building activity - housing, street, parking spaces ... that's about 20 football pitches. In recent years there's been calls to slow this down or to renaturalize more areas (Vienna could use that - for many years the city planners loved covering open areas in stone, asphalt, and concrete, and it's only slowly changing).

Biggest problem: local planning is in the hands of local authorities, usually run by local business interests (it's quite common in small to mid-sized communities that the local business greats are also in politics, being mayor's etc.), with limited reach for federal laws to affect them. So you would have to restrict local communities' planning rights first, and that's hard to pish through.

[Josquius]

In Austria, about 13 hectars of natural soil are lost to building activity - housing, street, parking spaces ... that's about 20 football pitches. In recent years there's been calls to slow this down or to renaturalize more areas (Vienna could use that - for many years the city planners loved covering open areas in stone, asphalt, and concrete, and it's only slowly changing).

Biggest problem: local planning is in the hands of local authorities, usually run by local business interests (it's quite common in small to mid-sized communities that the local business greats are also in politics, being mayor's etc.), with limited reach for federal laws to affect them. So you would have to restrict local communities' planning rights first, and that's hard to pish through.

The first bit alarmed me a little. Sounded like the Hobbit faction of the English Greens, just opposed to all development anywhere ever.
The second bit though sounds a lot more reasonable. Its an issue in countries with municipalities have too much power that they can end up competing against each other rather than thinking holistically.

[Syt]

The main issue is that planners often look at short-term gains and don't consider long-term effects. Like increased flood risks, and if the road to farmer Karl really needs to be expanded at community expense so his summer tourists can reach him slightly more easily. Or if there needs to be another big parking lot for the expansion of the shops that move from the centers to the periphery. Also to be noted that almost none of that ground usage is for public transport in the countryside (which is incredibly lacking).

[grumbler]

I thinking that looking up the candidates and voting based on their policies rather than their appearance is cheating. The whole reason for not providing names in the OP is to force Languishites to choose candidates based on superficial evidence and then sharing their reasoning according to that evidence.

[Zanza]

The party.

[Sophie Scholl]

I thinking that looking up the candidates and voting based on their policies rather than their appearance is cheating. The whole reason for not providing names in the OP is to force Languishites to choose candidates based on superficial evidence and then sharing their reasoning according to that evidence.

I tend to look them up after as follow-ups like Syt's don't always happen in terms of who they are and what they represent. I find the little glimpses into different area's politics intriguing. Which I presume is somewhat the goal of such things?