Knittelfeld Putsch

Last updated April 15, 2019

Knittelfeld Putsch refers to a conference of the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) which took place on 7 September 2002 in the small Austrian town of Knittelfeld, Styria, called due to political differences within the party leadership. The events resulted in early federal elections in the same year.

The Freedom Party of Austria is a right-wing populist, national-conservative political party in Austria. The party, led by Heinz-Christian Strache, is a member of the Europe of Nations and Freedom group in the European Parliament, as well as of the Movement for a Europe of Nations and Freedom.

Austria, officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in Central Europe comprising 9 federated states. Its capital, largest city and one of nine states is Vienna. Austria has an area of 83,879 km² (32,386 sq mi), a population of nearly 9 million people and a nominal GDP of $477 billion. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Hungary and Slovakia to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the west. The terrain is highly mountainous, lying within the Alps; only 32% of the country is below 500 m (1,640 ft), and its highest point is 3,798 m (12,461 ft). The majority of the population speaks local Bavarian dialects as their native language, and German in its standard form is the country's official language. Other regional languages are Hungarian, Burgenland Croatian, and Slovene.

Knittelfeld is a city in Styria, Austria, located on the banks of the Mur river.

Background

Following the 1999 elections, the FPÖ became part of a coalition government led by ÖVP leader Wolfgang Schüssel, despite the FPÖ having garnered the larger number of votes.

Wolfgang Schüssel is an Austrian People's Party politician. He was Chancellor of Austria for two consecutive terms from February 2000 to January 2007. While being recognised as a rare example of an active reformer in contemporary Austrian politics, his governments were also highly controversial from the beginning, starting with the fact that he formed a coalition government with Jörg Haider's Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) on both occasions. In 2011, he retired from being an active member of parliament due to a multitude of charges of corruption against members of his governments.

During the summer of 2002, tension rose within the FPÖ, following losses in several local elections. Jörg Haider, former FPÖ leader and still Landeshauptmann of Carinthia, called for changes in government policy to reinvigorate the party's popularity, especially a tax reform. However, such a reform was out of reach in view of the catastrophic flood of August 2002.

Jörg Haider was an Austrian politician. He was Governor of Carinthia on two occasions, the long-time leader of the Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ) and later Chairman of the Alliance for the Future of Austria, a breakaway party from the FPÖ.

Landeshauptmann or Landeshauptfrau is the chairman of a state government and the supreme official of an Austrian state and the Italian autonomous provinces of South Tyrol and Trentino. His or her function is equivalent to that of a minister-president or premier. Until 1933 the term was used in Prussia for the head of government of a province, in the modern-day states of Germany the counterpart to Landeshauptmann (governor) is the Ministerpräsident (minister-president).

Tax reform is the process of changing the way taxes are collected or managed by the government and is usually undertaken to improve tax administration or to provide economic or social benefits. Tax reform can include reducing the level of taxation of all people by the government, making the tax system more progressive or less progressive, or simplifying the tax system and making the system more understandable or more accountable.

Events at Knittelfeld

On September 7, a party meeting was held at Knittelfeld, but the party chair and Vice Chancellor of Austria at that time, Susanne Riess-Passer, was not present. Most of the functionaries attending represented the opposition within the FPÖ of its traditional nationalist right wing.

The key symbolic moment of the meeting was a public tearing of a compromise paper between Riess-Passer and Haider by the Carinthian delegate Scheuch (some witnesses report that Haider instructed Scheuch to publicly tear the paper, so even though it was Scheuch who actually tore the paper up, it was Haider in reality who was engaging in the destruction of the accord). The following day, Riess-Passer, Minister of Finance Karl-Heinz Grasser (who was later reappointed in this position by the ÖVP) and the chairman of the FPÖ parliamentary club, Peter Westenthaler, announced their resignation, as did some other relatively pragmatic functionaries. Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel then renounced the coalition pact, which led to early elections being called, where the FPÖ lost approximately two thirds of its voters of 1999 and fell from 26.9% of the public vote to 10.0%.

Karl-Heinz Grasser is a former Austrian politician, who held the office of Austrian Minister of Finance from February 2000 to January 2007 as a member of the two subsequent governments of Wolfgang Schüssel. While at the time praised by many for consolidating Austria's budget, he has since then been known for his alleged involvement in major corruption scandals. For some time, he was also some kind of a jet set person after marrying Fiona Swarovski, the heir of the Swarovski crystal manufacturers in Tyrol, Austria.

Peter Westenthaler is an Austrian politician. He assumed his mother's maiden name Westenthaler instead of his former surname Hojač (Czech). A member of Jörg Haider's Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) up to the so-called "Knittelfeld Putsch" of 2002, he then worked for Frank Stronach's Magna Steyr, and in June 2006 was elected chairman of the newly founded Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZÖ).

The Chancellor of Austria is the head of government of the Austrian Republic. The chancellor chairs and leads the government, which is composed of him, the vice-chancellor and the ministers. Together with the president, who is head of state, the government forms the country's executive leadership.

Symbolic meaning

Since that time in the Austrian media the term "Knittelfelder" has been used to refer to party rebels in the FPÖ. You can also refer simply to "Knittelfeld" to refer to the events of the congress.

Aftermath

The coalition between ÖVP and FPÖ was renewed after the elections in spite of the FPÖ's weak showing at the polls. As the FPÖ continued to lose even more dramatically in subsequent local and also the 2004 European elections, tensions did not subside. In April 2005, Jörg Haider founded the Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZÖ), a new party, this time with the more pragmatic wing of the party, including all current FPÖ members of the federal government and most of the FPÖ's parliamentary representatives. Since then the BZÖ obtained 4.1% of the vote in the 2006 general election and got 7 seats in the National Council. The FPÖ rose from 10% to 11% in that election. Since then the FPÖ grew again, receiving 10.5% in the 2008 Lower Austria "Landtag" (provincial) election, more than doubling its 2003 result (4.5%). The BZÖ also participated in the Lower Austria election, but received only 0.72%, failing to pass the 4% threshold.

The Alliance for the Future of Austria is a right-wing populist and national conservative political party in Austria.

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References

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