Party Politics in Austria: From Proporz to Populism?

Abstract

Party politics in Austria has two distinctive features: institutionalized power sharing between the two main parties, known as Proporz, and a longstanding tradition of far-right populism. I examine whether these two phenomena are connected: Does reduced political competition correlate with vote shares for the far right? The results do not support the hypothesis that populist parties are stronger in places with reduced political competition and with Proporz institutions. Instead, the results show that Austrian populism has very deep historical roots. Historical party preferences in the 1930s explain a substantial part of the variation in far-right populist vote shares across Austrian regions today. Populism may also have economic consequences. Descriptive evidence shows that economic growth was 2 percentage points lower in Austria when far-right populists were in the national government, whereas no partisan differences can be found for the two main parties.