Austrian Greens enjoy historic electoral success 
By Mike Feinstein
advisor, International Committee, Green Party of the United States

For the first time ever, the Austrian Greens, Die Grünen, are the nation's third largest party in federal parlia­ment (Nationalrat, or National Council). In the October national elections, they won 21 out of 183 seats, receiving 11.05 percent and 520,130 votes.

The Austrian Greens' campaign emphasized drastically reducing use of oil and phasing-out of nuclear power. This campaign poster, featuring candidate Eva Glawischnig, says "It's possible without atom energy. Guaranteed." With the Greens ascent, Glawischnig is now third President of Parliament.

The Greens' campaign focused on job creation through building an ecological economy, countering arguments the party is bad for employment and business. The Greens also opposed racism and xenophobia, in the midst of harsh right-wing populism from Austria's two extreme-right parties.

This combination, bolstered with an em­phasis on: education, priority for women, organic food and social security helped the Greens increase the number of seats on the National Council by four extra seats from 2002 and seven from 1999.

By electing nine male and 12 female members of parliament (MP's), they are the only party to have more women than men in their parliamentary group. The group includes Ulrike Lunacek, co-chair­person of the European Greens (since May 2006), and Peter Pilz, who introduced a federal resolution to strip Cali­fornia Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of his Austrian citizenship after he failed to grant clemency from execution to former Los Angeles gang leader Tookie Williams.

Five parties received enough votes in the October election to enter the National Council, including the two right-wing parties (with 28 seats together), the Greens, the Social Democrats (68) and the People's Party (66). Neither of the major parties, however, are willing to go into a coalition with the right-wing parties. At the same time, 92 seats are needed for a majority, and neither have enough seats by themselves to go into coalition with the Greens. A Green-Social Democrat coalition would have 89 seats and a Green-People's Party would have 87. Despite their gains, the Greens are not in a position to negotiate for a coalition, meaning there will not be either a "red-green" nor a "black-green" government.

The most likely government will be a "Grand Coalition" between the Social Democrats and the People's Party, led by Social Democratic chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer. Negotiations have started in October and are supposed to last until January. However, if the two parties fail to reach an agreement, Austria could have a short period of time as a minority government and then hold new elections in the spring/summer of 2007.

European Green Party co-spokesperson Philippe Lamberts said, "the tough electoral campaign made by the Greens and their good electoral result are a guarantee for a tough opposition policy. They will be the only force driving for a social and ecological opposition that challenges the inevitable paralysis of the 'grand coalition' between the Social Democrats and the People's Party if they - as seems likely - form a government."

The Austrian Greens were formed as a national party in 1986, after a merge of two smaller Green Parties. They immediately won 4.82 percent and eight seats in the National Council that year and have had seats there ever since. At the regional level, the party is strongest in Tyrol (15.6 percent) and Vienna (14.6 percent).

This year they finished first in National Council elections in three Viennese districts (no. 6, 7 and 8), and their score in the regions varied between 5.81 percent (Burgenland) to 17.38 percent (Vienna).

For more information, see www.gruene.at 

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