Dunsa Masterclass – Right Wing Austrian Politics of Kurz
On 15 April 2019 upon the invitation of SIB-Amsterdam- Dutch United Nations Student Association Monika Baár gave a masterclass on the contemporary political situation in Austria and its historical antecedents.
The masterclass illuminates the historical context which helps us evaluate recent political developments in Austria and their implications for the future. It pays attention to the reluctance to coming to terms with the Nazi period, which culminated in the Waldheim affair in 1986.
This section includes showing an excerpt from the recent prize-winning documentary of Ruth Beckermann, Waldheim’s Waltz. Further, the masterclass looks into traditional cleavages in Austrian society, for example the antagonism between ‘Red Vienna’ and the conservative countryside.
It then focuses on the government of the world’s youngest prime minister, Sebastian Kurz, including the relationship to the European Union and to the Visegrad group, as well as discussing aspects of domestic politics, especially its relationship with its far right-wing coalition partner FPÖ and the role of anti-migration, anti-Semitic and anti-Islam rhetoric.
Last but not least, the masterclass also addresses resistance on the part of intellectuals to recent political developments, to that end it analyzes the writer’s Michael Köhlmaier’ speech on occasion of Austria’s Holocaust remembrance day in 2018.