Austrian Elections & Politics 5.0 (Burgenland state election - January 26)

[Tender Branson]

Chancellor Brigitte Bierlein and her cabinet will offer their resignation tomorrow to President Van der Bellen (which of course he will not accept and instead ask them to continue their work in office until a new government can be sworn in).

He will also officially ask Kurz to form this new government tomorrow.

https://orf.at/stories/3139229

[Tender Branson]

The count of the 1 million postal votes is underway and ÖVP+SPÖ are doing a bit worse in this count compared with the Sunday vote.

The FPÖ does much worse (but not as badly as yesterday). They are losing about 5-7%, compared with 10-11% yesterday at the precincts. That's probably because postal voters started to send in their ballots weeks ago already, when the last FPÖ-scandals were not yet known to voters.

Greens+NEOS+Pilz are doing much better with postal voters (as usual).

In Vienna, the SPÖ does badly with postal voters. Much worse than the ÖVP. Yesterday, their margin was SPÖ+5 vs. the ÖVP. This has now been cut to 3.5 points.

[Tender Branson]

Kurz said today that coalition talks "will take a very long time."

This has strategic reasons:

Until January, Austria will have another 3 state elections: Vorarlberg (in 2 weeks already), Styria (in November) and Burgenland (in January).

No matter which partner Kurz chooses for his government, a segment of the ÖVP will always dislike that choice. Kurz wants to keep ÖVP-enthusiasm high in the coming months, especially to re-colour Burgenland, which has been an SPÖ stronghold for 50 years and which voted ÖVP by 10 points yesterday (state elections are a bit different though).

Therefore wait until those elections are done with and only then announce the new government.

[Tender Branson]

An ÖVP-Green coalition would face a major roadblock:

They have no majority in the Bundesrat, the 2nd chamber of parliament representing the 9 states.

Not only that, they only have 24 of 61 seats there.

They can circumvent the Bundesrat when passing regular laws, by passing an additional motion of insistence.

But if they want to pass a constitutional law (2/3 majority in both chambers needed), such as stricter environmental protections (and this involves of course the states), they are far from a majority there.

So, in other words, if the Greens want to pass far-reaching climate change laws, they need the goodwill of SPÖ+NEOS. Otherwise a 2/3 majority is not possible.

[Tender Branson]

Only Lower Austria has not released their postal vote count yet.

In the other 8 states, turnout seems to be down 4% on average.

76% seems to be the final turnout then, a bit better than the 75.4% projected yesterday by SORA.

[Tender Branson]

The postal vote count has been another blow to the SPÖ:

They did worse than in the past elections and will drop to just 21% in the overall results.

Yesterday, they were projected at 22% ...

[Keep Calm and ...]

They finished counting:

https://wahl19.bmi.gv.at

[Tender Branson]

They finished counting:

https://wahl19.bmi.gv.at

There are still around 45.000 absentee ballots left to count on Thursday (the ones that were cast in a precinct other than the own).

But this won’t change a lot.

The Greens could get to 13.9% and NEOS to 8.2%, but that’s it.

Turnout: 75.8% (-4.2)

[Hnv1]

They finished counting:

https://wahl19.bmi.gv.at

Impressive results for Kurz. Is there no option for him to pull some FPÖ delegates and increment the ÖVP? Is floor crossing even done in Austrian politics?

[Lord Halifax]

Greens+NEOS+Pilz are doing much better with postal voters (as usual).

Do you think Pilz will pass 2%?

[Tender Branson]

They finished counting:

https://wahl19.bmi.gv.at

Impressive results for Kurz. Is there no option for him to pull some FPÖ delegates and increment the ÖVP? Is floor crossing even done in Austrian politics?

It happened before already, but it was very limited.

For example former BZÖ or Team Stronach members of parliament taken in by the ÖVP.

But this „group switching“ or Abwerben was later banned and is now no longer possible.

The FPÖ is also not falling apart right now as the BZÖ or TS once did. There is still a high loyalty in the party.

Sometimes, a few MPs are expelled though for Nazi comments and they become independent MPs.

[Tender Branson]

H.C. Strache’s FPÖ party membership will be officially suspended tomorrow:

https://orf.at/stories/3139264

The FPÖ will make a deep cut and leave the Strache-era behind ...

(Strache could run with his own independent list next year in the Vienna state election, a move which would shock the FPÖ).

[Mike88]

Correct me if I'm wrong Tender, but this seems to be the biggest landslide in Austrian elections since 1945, and only the second time the margin between the 2 main parties is more than 10%.

[Tender Branson]

Correct me if I'm wrong Tender, but this seems to be the biggest landslide in Austrian elections since 1945, and only the second time the margin between the 2 main parties is more than 10%.

Yes, that is true.

But it was also a very balanced vote this time:

67% voted for centrist parties (ÖVP+SPÖ+NEOS)
17% voted for leftist parties
16% voted for the FPÖ

Or if you see the ÖVP and their voters as right and half of NEOS as right, it was:

58% right
42% left

As always here.

[FredLindq]

Wow! ÖVP is larger than SPÖ and FPÖ togheter!

[Tender Branson]

H.C. Strache’s FPÖ party membership will be officially suspended tomorrow:

https://orf.at/stories/3139264

The FPÖ will make a deep cut and leave the Strache-era behind ...

(Strache could run with his own independent list next year in the Vienna state election, a move which would shock the FPÖ).

Strache has set a press statement for tomorrow morning.

It is expected that he will quit the FPÖ, before they kick him out ...

[Tender Branson]

BTW:

The results are very similar to the Bavarian state election of 2018 and their results in the 2017 German federal election.

[DL]

Or if you see the ÖVP and their voters as right and half of NEOS as right, it was:

58% right
42% left

As always here.

I seem to recall that in the 70s and 80s the SPO would win or come close to winning absolute majorities

[windjammer]

Could a OVP-NEOS minority govt happen?

[Oryxslayer]

Could a OVP-NEOS minority govt happen?

Who would back them up? FPO won't go into govt right now (support is just govt without the perks), and Greens have nothing to gain. Minorities only work when you have some sort of idea about your future.

Or if you see the ÖVP and their voters as right and half of NEOS as right, it was:

58% right
42% left

As always here.

I seem to recall that in the 70s and 80s the SPO would win or come close to winning absolute majorities

Yes, but the Urbanization of the left, loss of working class voters to populist parties, weaking of unions as jobs move east..these are global trends that all are occuring in some fashion in most countries regardless of local issues and coalitions that influence the baseline. In some countries, t he trend benefits parties of the left since  more voters become available, in other like Austria not so much. But unlike the german SPD, the SPO still has appeal and can easily get first place if theye had a good leader, message, and the OVP was facing the wrath rather than the sympathy of the voters.

[CumbrianLefty]

Wow! ÖVP is larger than SPÖ and FPÖ togheter!

Never happened before, presumably?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Or if you see the ÖVP and their voters as right and half of NEOS as right, it was:

58% right
42% left

As always here.

I seem to recall that in the 70s and 80s the SPO would win or come close to winning absolute majorities

But often with relatively small national leads: these were the days when the SPÖ and ÖVP would routinely take well over 90% of votes between them. Austria was not a normal democratic polity at the time - there was extreme polarisation and extremely high turnouts because of what had happened in the 1930s (the destruction of Red Vienna, the extremely brief civil war and 'Austrofascism' more than what happened after...). The country would have been ungovernable, but for the proportz system, which originated as a way of turning swords into ploughshares: even when there were single party governments, there was in practice a high degree of co-operation between the two once quite literal enemies. Long ago and far away now, of course.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I've never actually tried making these MS Paint style maps before, so this is probably ugly af and I can't guarantee there's no errors, but:



also Al et al must have mastered some dark wizardry to make these things
with hundreds of constituencies, damn

[Filuwaúrdjan]

[Tender Branson]

Thanks for the maps !

Salzburg and my region (Zell am See) in general has swung heavily to the ÖVP in recent years.

The Kurz effect here is particularly strong, with the party devouring the SPÖ and FPÖ. Also the Greens are not as strong anymore as they used to be in 2013.

My region was never among the best areas for the ÖVP historically (even though it always had a Christian-Social lean) and had an above average share for the SPÖ and FPÖ when compared to national results.

But now, the ÖVP share here is as high as in the traditional ÖVP strongholds in Tyrol or Eastern Styria or North-West Lower Austria.

Pinzgau/Pongau/Lungau (my electoral district) had a big economic expansion over the past 30 years with a big increase of social services and wealth (with all the negative consequences such as high traffic and congestion) brought by tourism for example. Maybe that is a reason why.