1 Standard Eurobarometer 70/2009.

2 Standard Eurobarometer 73/2010.

3 Standard Eurobarometer 70/2009.

4 Sozialwissenschaftliche Studiengesellschaft, Press Conference, Vienna, 22 Dec. 2008.

5 <www. europarl.eu/parliament/archive/elections2009/en/Austria>.

6 I will not dwell upon the details of the rows on bailout or no bailout the Europeans have fought since the Greek crisis. Suffice it to say that the first grants conceded by the EU were based on Article 122, para 2 TFEU, thus circumventing the no-bailout clause of Article 125. 254 Puntscher Riekmann: ‘Austria’s Dismal EU Membership’ Besides protests from different member states and political actors, this has also led to legal actions before the German Constitutional Court whose ruling is to be expected in the spring of 2011. See also Sonja Puntscher Riekmann, “Europas Verfassung nach Lissabon: Europäische Politik in der Finanz-und Wirtschaftskrise zwischen Pragmatismus und Legitimation,” in Rechtsfragen der Implementierung des Vertrags von Lissabon, ed. Thomas Eilmansberger, Stefan Griller, and Walter Obwexer (Vienna: Springer, 2010), 497-525.

7 Parlamentskorrespondenz Nr. 1032, 16 Dec. 2010; <www.parlinkom.gv.at/PAKT/PR/JAGR_2010/PK1032/>.

8 For the history of Austrian-EU relations, see Paul Luif, On the Road to Brussels: The Political Dimension of Austria’s, Finland’s, and Sweden’s Accession to the European Union (Vienna: Braumüller, 1995), 185-99; and Michael Gehler and Rolf Steininger, eds., The Neutrals and European Integration 1945-1995 (Vienna: Böhlau, 2000), 465-701.

9 In this context, another story is noteworthy: it was the then Foreign Minister Bruno Kreisky to launch the debate about how to organize relations between EFTA and the EEC in view of a possible British EEC membership. He pleaded for a coordinated approach of the remaining EFTA members. In a meeting in Vienna (1961), several points limiting the rapprochement were formulated (such as the power to making international treaties, neutrality-related decisions in the case of war or grave international crises, safeguarding of crucial supplies). However, when the British request of membership had been turned down, Sweden and Switzerland withdrew from this initiative, whereas Austria continued its efforts to reach an association treaty with the EEC. The different interpretations of this position notwithstanding, the story is interesting in that it differs from public discourses of the following decades in which the Austrian foreign policy was less European than globally oriented. See Luif, On the Road to Brussels, 186-87.

10 Helmut Kramer, “Österreichs Wirtschaftspolitik im Rahmen der EU,” in Europäisierung der österreichischen Politik: Konsequenzen der EU-Mitgliedschaft, ed. Heinrich Neisser and Sonja Puntscher Riekmann (Vienna: Wiener Universitätsverlag, 2002), 267-94; Hans Seidel, “Austro-Keynesianismus,” in Wirtschaftspolitische Blätter 29, no. 3 (1989): 11-15; Gunter Tichy, “Vom Glanz und Elend des Austro-Keynesianismus,” in Austro-Keynesianismus—Festschrift für Hans Seidel zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. Peter Mitter and Andreas Wörgötter, Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Beiträge 38 (Heidelberg: Physica Verlag, 1990), 76-101.

11 See Sonja Puntscher Riekmann, “The Politics of ‘Ausgrenzung,’ the Austrian Nazi Past, and the European Dimension of the New Radical Right,” in The Vranitzky Era in Austria, ed. Günter Bischof and Anton Pelinka, Contemporary Austrian Studies 7 (New Brunswick: Transaction, 1998).

12 Theo Öhlinger, “Die Europäisierung der österreichischen Verfassung,” in Europäisierung der österreichischen Politik, ed. Neisser and Puntscher Riekmann, 81-99.

13 This position is no longer unique, in particular after the ruling of the German Constitutional Court on the Treaty of Lisbon in 2009.

14 Theo Öhlinger, “Art. 23c bis 23f B-VG,” in Österreichisches Bundesverfassungsrecht: Textsammlung und Kommentar, ed. Karl Korinek and Michael Holubek (Vienna: Manz, 1999); Stefan Griller, “Die GASP und das Ende der immerwährenden Neutralität,” in Rechtsfragen in der Anwendung des Amsterdamer Vertrages, ed. Waldemar Hummer (Vienna: Manz, 2001), 261-80.

15 For the rise and fall of the use of these rights, see Johannes Pollak and Peter Slominski, “Influencing EU Politics? The Case of the Austrian Parliament,” Journal of Common Market Studies 41, no. 4 (2003): 707-29. The authors hold that “From a legal point of view the Austrian Parliament has in its hands an exceptionally strong instrument for influencing and controlling the government’s EU policy. However, it refrains from using it, at least with regard to adopting binding opinions. Whereas, in the beginning, the willingness to employ the new instrument was Global Austria: Austria’s Place in Europe and the World 255 rather high, this changed dramatically during later years when traditional modes of party politics were reestablished. Meanwhile the instrument is not used primarily to participate in the legislative process, but rather as an informational tool, mostly by the opposition, to control governmental performance in EU-related matters” (p. 723).

16 Report by Martti Ahtisaari, Jochen Frowein, and Marcelino Oreja, in Eine europäische Erregung: Die Sanktionen der Vierzehn gegen Österreich im Jahr 2000: Analysen und Kommentare, ed. Erhard Busek and Martin Schauer, Schriftenreihe des DDr.-Herbert-Batliner-Europainstituts Band 8 (Vienna: Böhlau, 2003), 538-67.

17 For interesting analyses of the whole affair, see the contributions in ibid.

18 See the articles by Andreas Resch and Dieter Stiefel as well as by Alexander Smith in this volume.

19 Helmut Kramer, “Österreichs Wirtschaftspolitik im Rahmen der EU,” 275 (my translation).

20 Sonja Puntscher Riekmann, “La dimension européenne du phénomène Haider,” in La crise autrichienne de la culture politique européenne, ed. Jacques Le Rider and Nicolas Levrat (Brussels: P. I. E.-Peter Lang, 2004), 135-50.

21 Empirical studies show higher national growth rates in the first years after accession and after enlargement, but normalization thereafter. As to the liberalization and competition effects economists are skeptical about their real impact on the national economy: it seems to be high in some sectors, but lower in most others. See Fritz Breuss, “Wirtschaftliche Effekte der EU-Mitgliedschaft in Finnland, Österreich und Schweden,” in Österreich, Schweden, Finnland: Zehn Jahre Mitgliedschaft in der Europäischen Union, ed. Paul Luif (Vienna: Böhlau, 2007), 235-65.

22 “Arbeitslosigkeit im April um 3,3 Prozent gesunken,” Die Presse, 1 May 2010, <diepresse.com/home/wirtschaft/economist/562169/Arbeitslosigkeit-im-April-um-33-Prozent-gesunken> (12 Feb. 2011). These figures result from traditional Austrian statistics. According to European statistics that rely on different counting methods, figures are much lower.

23 Österreichische Gesellschaft für Europapolitik/IFES, Das Europäische Parlament und die Europawahlen im Meinungsbild der österreichischen Bevölkerung, Vienna, May 2009.

24 Kronen Zeitung, 28 June 2008 (my translation).

25 First from 1989-91, when he had to step down for his positive remarks about Hitler’s employment policy, and second from 1999-2008, the year of his death.

26 Stenographisches Protokoll der 109. Sitzung des Nationalrates, 11 May 2005, 44.

27 Ibid., 46.

28 Ibid., 47.

29 Ibid., 47-48.

30 In 1978, in a national referendum Austrian citizens voted against the first and only nuclear power plant, thus terminating any further nuclear energy policy.

31 Stenographisches Protokoll, 55. Sitzung des Nationalrates der Republik Österreich, 9 April 2008, 74-81. In his speech Strache concludes that the incumbent coalition fears the people who, however, have an appropriate feeling of what is right and what is wrong. As the denial of a referendum turns right into wrong, Strache considers resistance a duty. He then proposes a motion for a resolution in which he spells out the need for a referendum. The motion though did not reach the majority.

32 Ibid., 80.

33 Ibid., 119.

34 Ibid., 94-98.

35 Ibid., 120-22.

36 Ibid., 97-101.

37 Stefan Griller,“Ausgestaltung der Mitwirkung des Parlaments in Österreich,” in Rechtsfragen der Implementierung des Vertrages von Lissabon, ed. Eilmansberger, Griller, and Obwexer, 441-66.

38 Ibid., 462.

39 Johannes Pollak and Sonja Puntscher Riekmann, “The Austrian Presidency: Pragmatic Management,” Journal of Common Market Studies 45 (2007): 7-16. For the presidency of 1996, see also Sonja Puntscher Riekmann, “Management gegen Vision: Zu einem falschen Widerspruch der österreichischen Ratspräsidentschaft,” Die Union 1998/2.

40 For instance, when it became clear also to the general public that Austrian university law collided with EU anti-discrimination provisions, the incumbent government formed by the People’s Party and the Freedom Party reacted by attacking the European Court of Justice. The government tried to conceal that the problem had been lingering since accession, whereas Austria had been given several years to correct the contradiction. Chancellor Schüssel criticized not only the relevant ECJ ruling but questioned the role of the court in general. See Wiener Zeitung, 7 Aug. 2009.

41 Österreichische Gesellschaft für Europapolitik/IFES, Das Europäische Parlament und die Europawahlen im Meinungsbild der österreichischen Bevölkerung, Vienna, May 2009.

42 Ewald Wiederin, “Bund und Länder: Tut jeder, was er kann, und kann jeder, was er muss?”, in Baustelle Bundesstaat: Perspektiven der Weiterentwicklung des politischen Systems Österreich, ed. Friedrich Michael Steger (Vienna: Braumüller, 2007), 23-29.

43 Liesbet Hooghe and Gary Marks, “A Postfunctionalist Theory of European Integration: From Permissive Consensus to Constraining Dissensus,” British Journal of Political Science 39, no. 1 (2008): 1-23.

44 During the second Austrian Council Presidency held in 2006 the coalition of the People’s Party with the BZÖ in order to avoid potential dissensus had continuously to strike a balancing act. This led to the choice for an utterly pragmatic approach: the presidency was well prepared (as was the case in 1998) by the bureaucracy, but it was void of inspiring moments. See Pollak and Puntscher Riekmann, “The Austrian Presidency.”