The political party on the verge of leading Austria would take an already conservative country into a growing group of nations shifting to the far-right of European politics. It has flirted with Nazi slogans, cozied up to Russia and drawn warnings from Holocaust survivors’ groups. It campaigned on promises to deport immigrants and ban political forms of Islam.
The Freedom Party, known as the FPÖ, and its firebrand leader, Herbert Kickl, were given the chance to form a governing coalition this week, after efforts to bar them from power collapsed. If they succeed in forming a government, it would be a shock to the Austrian political system and a further jolt to Western Europe, where similarly far-right parties are surging in France, Germany and elsewhere.
But it would not be a surprise.
The Freedom Party’s rise follows years of growing acceptance of the far right in Austrian politics. Its growth has been helped by scandals and an ideological shift in the more mainstream conservative party that has led Austria’s governments for 15 of the last 25 years.
Unlike in neighboring Germany, where all other parties have refused to include the right-wing-populist Alternative for Germany in federal ruling coalitions, other parties in Austria have allowed the Freedom Party to share power for years as a junior partner.
The Freedom Party has broadened its appeal in recent elections with an anti-establishment message that harshly criticizes immigrants, Covid restrictions, the European Union and support for Ukraine in its defense against the Russian invasion. The party has gained support from blue-collar workers, university graduates and, critically, women. In elections for the European Parliament this summer, it was the most popular party among Austrian voters under the age of 35.
“The idea that the FPÖ is somehow politically taboo, that train has long left the station,” said Laurenz Ennser-Jedenastik, a political scientist at the University of Vienna.
The Freedom Party was founded by former members of the SS, the Nazi paramilitary force, in the 1950s. It was largely shunned in its early years, but then slowly became part of the political establishment.
The party first entered a national government with progressive Social Democrats in 1983 and has served in four ruling coalitions since, the most recent just six years ago. It’s also active on the state level and is in coalitions in the majority of Austria’s nine states.
Until the late 1980s, the Freedom Party was a small, elitist entity largely associated with certain nationalist university fraternities. A new leader, Jörg Haider, attracted more voters by adopting campaign rhetoric harshly critical of foreigners.
That focus has become the driving force of the modern party, sharpened and intensified by Mr. Kickl, who wrote speeches for Mr. Haider early in his career. Mr. Kickl steered the party into increasingly provocative slogans, including the xenophobic “Viennese blood — too many foreigners does no one any good.”
In 2017, the Freedom Party joined a governing coalition with the conservative People’s Party. Karin Kneissl, then the Freedom Party’s choice of foreign minister, was widely criticized for dancing at her 2018 wedding with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. She has since moved to Russia.
The administration and the coalition collapsed quickly in a scandal involving a hidden camera, a fake Russian heiress and a former Freedom Party leader in 2019.
During the administration, Mr. Kickl served as the country’s interior minister, putting him in charge of immigration control, a subject that has been integral to the party’s platform.
He made headlines back then for suggesting “concentrating” refugees in centralized facilities. Although Mr. Kickl later claimed that he was not trying to provoke, many believe that his use of a Nazi-era phrase referencing concentration camps was deliberate.
It was also not isolated. Mr. Kickl’s party has since repeatedly invoked the term “Volkskanzler” — “the people’s chancellor” — that was used by Hitler.
While others in the party have wanted to soften the anti-immigrant rhetoric, Mr. Kickl has capitalized on raw, emotional appeals to native-born Austrian workers. He tapped into discontent over an influx of refugees to Austria from the Middle East and, later, Ukraine. At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, he rallied opposition to vaccine mandates, lockdowns and masks.
In last fall’s campaign, Mr. Kickl promised to build “Fortress Austria” — by resorting to strict border control measures, the forced deportation of immigrants and a suspension of asylum rights for refugees, which would require breaking from a European Union agreement on migration. He called for a reversal of measures meant to fight climate change and a renewed focus on fossil fuels.
He has also pushed for political changes that some analysts say would push Austria toward a more authoritarian model of government, akin to Viktor Orban in Hungary. Those changes include new referendum procedures that would allow a relatively small slice of the electorate to force a national vote to overturn the government or dismiss individual ministers.
Mr. Kickl’s platform appealed to many voters, with the party winning the most seats in the September election for the national assembly. “There’s more demand for a certain toughness from politics,” said Christoph Hofinger, an Austrian election researcher.
For some, it caused alarm. After the election, Christoph Heubner, the executive vice president for the International Auschwitz Committee, said that for Holocaust survivors, the victory had added “a new alarming chapter to their fears and concerns.”
The Freedom Party has benefited, in part, from the problems of the People’s Party. The group won the chancellorship handily in 2017, after turning toward the right on many issues. But the People’s Party quickly fell into a series of scandals, including one related to rigged opinion polls published in the press. It also faced voter discontent over inflation and Covid restrictions, along with its most recent coalition partner, the Green Party.
After the election loss, Karl Nehammer, the incumbent chancellor from the People’s Party, said he would not enter into a coalition with Mr. Kickl. Many saw the promise, made during the campaign, as a play to hold on to the chancellery, rather than an ideological stance, since the two parties have a long history of working together in state and federal governments.
“There was never any fundamental criticism of the FPÖ’s understanding of democracy or the rule of law” from the conservatives, Mr. Ennser-Jedenastik said.
Despite months of trying, the People’s Party was unable to form a coalition without the far right. And Mr. Nehammer announced his resignation from the chancellorship this week, paving the way for the Freedom Party to emerge on top in a coalition.
In a governing coalition, Mr. Kickl will not be able to deliver on all of his promises. The next Austrian government will need to close a budget deficit, which could hamper his economic agenda, including tax cuts and social spending increases.
But the party’s popularity will give him a strong voice as he pushes for policy changes directed at foreigners and refugees, according to analysts. Likely among them: cutting social services to those who don’t speak German or reducing financial aid for refugees.
During the fall election, 29 percent of Austrians voted for the Freedom Party. Current polling now puts voter support at more than 35 percent.
“If Kickl ever feels like the other side is not taking these talks seriously, he just gets up from the table and forces early elections,” said Mr. Hofinger.
