Word: austria
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...right parties is not a reprise of the 1930s; it is the consequence, say commentators, of more recent developments. There is massive disenchantment with the country's mainstream Social Democratic Party and conservative People's Party, which have shared power in a "grand coalition" in Austria for all but 18 of the 63 years since the end of the Second World War. Their latest coalition government lasted just 18 months and was widely considered a catastrophe for failing to produce a single major legislative initiative. The result also underscores growing unhappiness with an expanded European Union in a Central European...
...astonishing to see how the mainstream parties have resurrected the right wing in Austria," says Thomas Hofer, a political analyst and former editor at the newsmagazine Profil. "Just three years ago the right wing was nowhere. But the last government gave them new life. This was the largest and most dramatic protest vote [since the Second World...
...have suddenly ideologically moved to the right is certainly a false assumption," writes. "The reasons for the comet-like rise of the right lies, rather, in the behavior of the long-established people's parties. And this indeed poses a threat for the freedom of opinion and ideas in Austria...
...Freedom Party, meanwhile, saw its support jump by more than half to 18%, and was the outright winner among young Austrians under the age of 30. Haider, who broke with the Freedom Party to form his own Alliance for the Future of Austria in 2005, doubled his support in the few weeks immediately preceding the polls to garner an unexpected 11%. Within the 183-seat parliament, the Freedom Party is projected to take 35 seats, up from 21, while Haider's party is expected to get 21, up from just...
...absence of a clear winner, coalition talks to form a government are expected to drag on for months. Both big mainstream parties have vowed that they will not form a coalition with the far right, but given the strength of those parties' showing, and the weakness of Austria's other small parties, including the Greens, commentators are not ruling anything out. For his part, Haider said after the vote that the two far-right parties should consider papering over their differences and joining forces. "Voters now expect us to do something for Austria," he said. "They do not want...