Der ‘autoritäre Ständestaat’ in Österreich und die Diktaturen im Osteuropa der Zwischenkriegszeit [The ‘authoritarian corporate state’ in Austria and the dictatorships in Eastern Europe during the interwar period]

Abstract

This article examines the character of the political system which was introduced in Austria in 1933, mainly by the Austrian Canchellor Engelbert Dollfuß and his followers in the Christlichsoziale Partei. Without doubt this 'Autoritäre Ständestaat', as it was called by its political architects in the Christlichsoziale Partei, was a dictatorial system established by the means of a coup d'état against the democratic parlamentary system of 1918-20. But was it also a fascist system? Indeed the term 'Austro-Faschismus' arose at the same time as the Dollfuß-Schuschnigg regime came into existence in 1933. This article deals with the question whether or not the political system in Austria between 1933 and 1938 can be described as a 'fascist' one. To answer this question two approaches have been applied. The first approach compares the Austrian dictatorship with the large number of dictatorial systems which arose in the newly established states in Central Eastern Europe in the course of the interwar period, some of them shortly after the end of the First World War, others later in the 1930s. The second approach focuses on the modern theory of fascism. The current discourse on the term 'Faschismus' will be briefly outlined and can then be applied at the 'Austrofaschismus'.