2024 Austrian Elections: NATO membership should come soon, but it won’t
By Aimé Mühlemann
As Austria is slowly edging closer to its 2024 national parliamentary elections in the autumn, a lot is on the line. With the right-wing populist FPÖ leading in the polls over the social democratic SPÖ and the conservative ÖVP, a whole array of policies are set to change in the Alpine nation that was only granted independence in 1955 after signing its permanent neutrality clause into its constitution, which “prohibits entry into military alliances and the establishment of foreign military bases on Austrian territory”.
One of the FPÖ’s main points of distinction from other parties, and thus a centrepiece of its campaign, has been its stance towards Russia and Ukraine. While the current government, consisting of the ÖVP and Greens, has been relatively steadfast in its support for Ukraine, the FPÖ continues to take an alternative position, viewing Putin’s Russia as an effective constraint on a “liberal cultural and economic agenda” pursued by the EU and the US. This itself is not an outlier — there are several European countries with rising right-wing parties attempting to reframe the war in Ukraine as a burden for ‘the people’, including in France, Germany and Italy. However, what has increasingly distinguished Austria and its political landscape from these countries is the continually high popular support for a relatively passive neutrality, meaning not only refraining from military action but also from political action “to promote peaceful relations through mediation”. In the case of Austria, though, this is increasingly viewed as an “excuse for passive acquiescence to injustices of an aggressor” . With popular support for maintaining neutrality at a staggering 71% in the summer of 2022, the ÖVP has shied away from a public debate about the security of its future and Austria’s place in Europe and the world; leaving this space open to be capitalised on by the FPÖ, who have strong ties to Putin’s United Russia party.
Instead of thus seeing a large shift in security policy, as observed for example in Germany’s Zeitenwende or in Sweden and Finland’s applications to NATO, Austria continues to cling on to the past. While it has pledged to raise its defence spending by 70% until 2028 as a result of foreign and domestic pressure, it currently spends less than 1% of GDP on its military, similar to states such as Malta or Luxembourg. In the same poll as above, only 17% of Austrians supported giving up neutrality to join NATO-only half as much as in neighbouring Switzerland, which can seem surprising as Austrians would have multiple reasons to seek closer security ties and alignment with Brussels and Washington.
Primarily, Austria has reason to fear that Russia might not be that far away from its borders. While the war in Ukraine alone is only about 500 kilometres away from Vienna, another potential security threat looms. As former Chancellor and current Foreign Minister, Alexander Schallenberg, stated in an interview in August of last year to El País, “Russia has the ability to interfere in the Balkans […] and generate a crisis”. With the region being known internationally for its chronic instability, growing political unrest in Bosnia and Herzegovina and problems between Kosovo and Serbia — which continues to have strong ties to Putin — appear to make the threat of a conflict fuelled by Russian interests in Austria’s backyard a real issue. This is especially relevant when considering the massive economic interest Austria has in that region, being “the largest foreign investor in Slovenia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, the second-largest foreign investor in Slovakia, Croatia, Bulgaria, North Macedonia as well as Serbia and furthermore among the top foreign investors in the remaining countries of the region”.
More importantly, Austria has yet to accept the changing realities of Europe since the Cold War. Its neutrality, forced upon it at first, steadily became more popular in the decade following the Second World War. This happened during a time when it was geographically clenched between Warsaw Pact and NATO states, making it a lucrative necessity to stay out of conflicts between the two sides and build economic and political bridges instead. Geopolitical realities have shifted: Austria’s only non-NATO neighbour state is Switzerland, reducing the appeal to broker equally between two blocs. Economically and politically, it is even more entrenched within European and Western institutions; primarily the EU. There are no bridges anymore, as Foreign Minister Schallenberg stated to POLITICO, as the conditions necessary to build bridges no longer exist.
The issue is the severe misunderstanding or illusion of the global situation within Austria, where the population continues to see itself as a mediating country between Russia and the West, exemplified in the continued import of the majority of its gas from Russia and business with its companies despite sanctions and growing dissatisfaction. Furthermore, Western intelligence agencies have grown increasingly reluctant to share sensitive information with Austria due to its close connections with Russia, decreasing the security potential of its citizens. Society continues to believe that it can stay out of conflicts and hold on to its prosperity, security, and place in the world at the same time, which is simply no longer tenable. Austria has already renounced its political neutrality, a vaguely defined term, by embracing EU sanctions against Russia, but in doing so has left its military security vulnerable by clearly choosing sides. Indeed, while Russia still does business with Austria, it has placed it on its list of unfriendly countries.
While the minds of leading Austrian bureaucrats, diplomats, military officers, security experts and even some government figures have started to change as they grapple with the steadily increasing security and integrity issues, the Austrian public is far away from any move towards ending neutrality. The question here is: if not even the war in Ukraine can act as a wake-up call, what can?
The upcoming elections will probably not demonstrate such an awakening as the FPÖ, which continues blaming the EU and Washington as the real security threat, continues to climb in the polls. If it governs, as feared by many, it most likely won’t be able to do so alone as it won’t hold a majority in parliament and will thus have to compromise on key issues. This alone shouldn’t be reassuring: even maintaining the status-quo will negatively impact Austria’s security and global image in the years to come. The other parties, which apart from the liberal NEOS polling at 10% have yet to embrace closer ties with NATO, should follow the experts and do so as soon as possible.
Aimé Mühlemann is a 2023–24 European Horizons Transatlantic Fellow and undergraduate student in Politics and International Relations at University College London. As President of the local chapter and originally from Switzerland, he is strongly interested in EU diplomacy with non-EU states in Europe as well as global climate politics.
