ABSTRACT
The Austrian political system has been regarded as a somewhat deviant case among the family of Western European democracies because it was characterised by a very high degree of political stability. That perception was derived in large measure from looking at the Austrian Lager, which provided the socio-political underpinning of a highly stable party system. This chapter analyses the factors leading to the erosion of the traditional pattern of Austrian electoral behaviour. It discusses the consequences for future patterns of party competition. The chapter examines long-term trends in the development of attitudes toward political parties and in voting behaviour in order to describe the changes in voter-party relationships over the last four decades. A detailed analysis of the 1990 general elections will facilitate the identification of different groups of voters and thus permit an empirically based perspective on the new structure of electoral competition in Austria.
