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Austrian nationalism

Flag of Austria
Heldenplatz (Heroes' Square) in Vienna with the statue of Archduke Charles of Austria in front of Hofburg Palace, Charles was Austria's main military leader who fought against France during the Napoleonic Wars.

Austrian nationalism (Austrian German: Österreichischer Nationalismus) is the nationalism that asserts that Austrians are a nation and promotes the cultural unity of Austrians.[1] Austrian nationalism originally developed as a cultural nationalism that emphasized a Catholic religious identity. This in turn led to its opposition to unification with Protestant-majority Prussia, something that was perceived as a potential threat to the Catholic core of Austrian national identity.[2] It was also used to protect the rule of the Habsburgs.

Austrian nationalism first arose during the Napoleonic Wars, with Joseph von Hormayr as a prominent Austrian nationalist political leader at the time.[3] In the 1930s the Fatherland Front government of Engelbert Dollfuss and Kurt Schuschnigg rejected current pan-German aspirations to join Austria with a Protestant-dominated Germany, whilst not wholly rejecting a potential union and claiming that any unification of Austria with Germany would require a federal German state where Austria and Austrians were guaranteed privileged status recognizing an Austrian nation within a German Kulturnation.[4] Following the events of World War II and Nazism, Austrians began to reject the German identity, and a broader Austrian identity replaced it.[5][6] After the war, Austrians went as far as describing themselves as "Hitler's first victim".[7]

In the post-World War II period proponents who recognize an Austrian nation have rejected a German identity of Austrians and have emphasized the non-Germanic heritage of Austrian culture including Celtic, Illyrian, Roman, Slavic and Magyar.[8] Proponents who recognize Austrians as a nation claim that Austrians have Celtic heritage, as Austria is the location of the first characteristically Celtic culture (Hallstatt culture) to exist.[9] Contemporary Austrians express pride in having Celtic heritage and Austria possesses one of the largest collections of Celtic artifacts in Europe.[10] In addition to German, the State of Austria also recognizes three minority languages in the country.

Austrian nationalism has been challenged internally. The main rival nationalism has been German nationalism. Another rival nationalism emerged after the defeat of Austria-Hungary in World War I, Bavarian nationalism which challenged the new Austrian Republic with proposals for Austria to join Bavaria.[11] At this time the Bavarian government held particular interest in incorporating the regions of North Tyrol and Upper Austria into Bavaria.[12] This was a serious issue in the aftermath of World War I with significant numbers of Austria's North Tyrolese declaring their intention to have North Tyrol join Bavaria.[13]

  1. ^ Motyl 2001, pp. 31–32.
  2. ^ Spohn, Willfried (2005), "Austria: From Habsburg Empire to a Small Nation in Europe", Entangled identities: nations and Europe, Ashgate, p. 61
  3. ^ Owen Connelly. The French revolution and Napoleonic era. Harcourt College Publishers, 1999. Pp. 254.
  4. ^ Discursive Construction of National Identity. P. 52.
  5. ^ Motyl 2001, p. 32.
  6. ^ Tschiggerl, Martin (2021). "Significant otherness nation-building and identity in postwar Austria". Nations and Nationalism. 27 (3): 782–796. doi:10.1111/nana.12677. ISSN 1469-8129.
  7. ^ Beniston 2003.
  8. ^ Bruckmüller 1993, pp. 198–9.
  9. ^ Carl Waldman, Catherine Mason. Encyclopedia of European Peoples. Infobase Publishing, 2006. P. 42.
  10. ^ Kevin Duffy. Who Were the Celts? Barnes & Noble Publishing, 1996. P. 20.
  11. ^ Suda Lorena Bane, Ralph Haswell Lutz. Organization of American Relief in Europe, 1918-1919: Including Negotiations Leading Up to the Establishment of the Office of Director General of Relief at Paris by the Allied and Associated Powers. Stanford University Press, 1943. P. 119.
  12. ^ Macartney 1926, p. 112.
  13. ^ Carsten 1986, p. 3.

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