Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ)

The Free­dom Par­ty of Aus­tria (FPÖ), found­ed in 1956 as the suc­ces­sor to the Fed­er­a­tion of Inde­pen­dents, is a right-wing pop­ulist, nation­al-con­ser­v­a­tive par­ty that has played a recur­ring role in Aus­tri­an pol­i­tics. Ini­tial­ly posi­tioned with­in lib­er­al and nation­al-lib­er­al tra­di­tions, it trans­formed under Jörg Haider’s lead­er­ship in the late 1980s into a force char­ac­ter­ized by anti-immi­gra­tion, Euroscep­ti­cism, and nation­al­ism. The FPÖ has pre­sent­ed itself as the guardian of Aus­tri­an iden­ti­ty against elites, migra­tion, and deep­er Euro­pean inte­gra­tion, while cul­ti­vat­ing a strong anti-Mus­lim stance. It has joined gov­ern­ing coali­tions sev­er­al times, most notably from 2000 to 2005 and 2017 to 2019, but has also faced inter­nal splits and major scan­dals, such as the 2019 “Ibiza affair.” Under its cur­rent leader, Her­bert Kickl, the par­ty has regained momen­tum, win­ning its strongest elec­toral result in 2024 with close to 29% of the vote, mak­ing it a cen­tral play­er in Austria’s polit­i­cal landscape.

Sources:

• Free­dom Par­ty of Aus­tria – Britannica
• Free­dom Par­ty of Aus­tria – Wikipedia
• The Rise of the Far-Right Free­dom Par­ty (FPÖ)
• Why Austria’s Far Right Is Rising
• Austria’s Free­dom Par­ty: Islam and the New Right