ABSTRACT
The chapter describes candidate selection procedures of old and new parties competing in recent Austrian legislative elections, based on analyses of party statutes, media reports and interviews. The complex three-tier proportional electoral system introduced at the beginning of the 1990s impacts differently on the seat allocation of large and small parties. New parties have been attentive to its mechanics, but their selection procedures also reflect party ideology and party type. Some of the old parties have reformed their rules ahead of the 2017 election. The People’s Party accepted a centralizing push by new party leader Sebastian Kurz and, like the Social Democratic Party, implemented for the first time a gender zipper system for all candidate lists.
