Linz program (German nationalism)

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The Linz program was a basic paper of Austrian German nationalism drawn up in Linz in 1882 . The motto of the document was "not liberal , not clerical , but national " and called for the constitutional and economic unbundling of the various peoples of Cisleithania , the closer connection of its German-speaking areas to the German Reich as well as freedom of the press , freedom of assembly and general democratization. It also contained some socialist or social-democratic- seeming social reform proposals from today's perspective . The initiators and directors of its elaboration were the politicians Victor Adler and Georg von Schönerer , the politician and journalist Engelbert Pernerstorfer and the historian and publicist Heinrich Friedjung .

If the Linz program was originally a document of broad consensus among anti-clerical reform politicians from different social and intellectual backgrounds, after the divergence of Adler and Schönerer and especially after the addition of a so-called " Aryan paragraph " and other anti-Semitic regulations proposed by Schönerer in 1885, it was practically only from Supporters of Schönerer held up.

State political demands

The core requirement of the Linz program was the almost complete separation of Cisleithanien and Transleithanien . The two so-called halves of the empire had been formally independent states since the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, but not only had a common head of state and a common army , they also pursued a common foreign policy and, above all, were closely intertwined economically. Many Austrians perceived the regular subsidy payments made by the Austrian to the Hungarian half of the empire as fundamentally unfair or at least disproportionately high; in addition, halting annual renegotiations repeatedly led to economic and security policy blockades. According to the Linz program, the dual role of Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary , which the respective head of the Habsburgs had fulfilled since 1867, was to be retained; Apart from that, and from a rather vague military assistance obligation, the two states should be completely decoupled.

Similar to Hungary, Galicia and Bukowina , two particularly economically weak crown countries of Austria, should be released into factual and formal responsibility. The crown land of Dalmatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina were to be ceded to Hungary for the time being, and in the long term they were to form a “Kingdom of the Southern Slavs” together with the previously Hungarian-ruled Croatia , and as such also to be emancipated. An implementation of these demands would have relieved the remaining rump of Cisleithania politically and economically, in particular because the state would have got rid of almost all of its Poles and most of its " Eastern Jews " - people who were extremely unpopular among other Austrians.

Austria would essentially only of his German , Czech- and Slovene dominated crown lands passed. Not only were these areas relatively affluent and politically well developed, but above all it was clear to see that they were all parts of the Holy Roman Empire , which fell in 1806 . According to its authors, the implementation of the Linz program would have made a closer connection or even a connection between German-speaking Austria and the German Reich, the long-term goal of German nationalism, much easier. As a first step towards unification, the Linz program envisaged a customs union between Austria and the German Empire.

Social policy demands

In addition to its German-national core, the Linz program contained demands for freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, secularization and the extension of the right to vote to previously excluded social classes. In addition, the manifesto called for a comprehensive social reform; among other things, a state pension and accident insurance should be set up, women and child labor should be largely prohibited. The Linz program thus contained almost all of the central demands of the social democracy that was only formed in Austria in 1889 , but without seeing itself as inspired by Marxism or socialism .

anti-Semitism

In its original form, the Linz program was more generally chauvinistic than specifically anti-Semitic . Although its authors openly admitted the view that it would be advantageous for Austria to expel its approximately one million Galician Jews from the state association, since these are culturally too strange and economically ineffective, they also took the same assumption with regard to the Catholic Poles and the Orthodox Ruthenians . The proposal to establish a new state border between the unassimilated or hardly assimilated , mostly poorly “Eastern Jews” and the rest of Austria, also found support among many residents of western crown lands who were Jewish and of Jewish origin. In addition to other co-authors, Adler and Friedjung were themselves of Jewish descent.

The revision by Schönerer published in 1885 was explicitly anti-Semitic. Between 1882 and 1885, Schönerer came to the conclusion that the “Jewish influence” on Austria's public life was the most pressing problem, the “elimination” of this influence was “essential”. In this sense, Schönerer expanded the Linz program to include a provision that excluded Jewish people and people of Jewish origin from any membership in German national parties and associations, since they were denied their personal qualifications to participate in the German nation. Schönerer broke with this not only with Adler and Friedjung, but also with many other German nationalists. Even Lueger, who advocated modern anti-Judaism , could not identify with Schoner's Aryan paragraph.

Adler and Lueger not only rejected Schonerer's revision, but also turned away from the original version in the course of the 1880s. From the end of the 1880s onwards, practically only the so-called Schöneians accepted the Linz program. Over time it was forgotten that the Linz program was originally also supported by later Social Democrats and Christian Socials. In the memory of the public, the paper became a specifically Schöneian matter from the start; instead of the jointly developed version, the unauthorized extended version of Schönerer was now considered the real and actual Linz program.

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