How Radical Right-Wing Populism Has Shaped Recent Migration Policy in Austria and Germany

Abstract

At the outset of the 2015 refugee crisis, Germany pursued an accepting asylum policy, potentially to mitigate its declining population. Austria, facing the same demographic challenges, closed itself to refugees. Differences in radical right-wing populism (RRP) in the two countries provide the basis for understanding their asylum policies. After the Second World War, Germany’s collective memory stigmatized far-right parties, while Austria’s did not. The radicalization spiral reproduces these differences today, allowing Austria’s Freedom Party to influence migration policy by pulling voters and mainstream parties to the right, while Germany’s RRP parties were unable to do the same before the crisis.

Keywords:

• Germany
• Austria
• radical right
• populism
• refugees
• migration
• asylum

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to thank Johan Ahr, Michael Anthony Iasilli, Tina Mavrikos-Adamou, Stefanie E. Nanes, Rosanna Perotti, discussants at the 2018 Council of European Studies and New York State Political Science Association conferences, and three anonymous reviewers.