The ethnically and culturally heterogeneous nation-state of Austria is one of the many remnant states of Austria-Hungary, a vast multinational empire that ceased to exist in 1918.

[1] Austria's first attempt at republican governance after the fall of the monarchy in 1918 was severely hampered by the crippling economic burden of war reparations required by the victorious Allies.

Austria's First Republic (1918–1938) made some pioneering reforms in the 1920s, particularly in Vienna, that served as models for the social-welfare states of post-World War I Europe.

However, the Republic gradually developed into the Austrofascist dictatorship between 1933 and 1934 under Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss, who was assassinated by Nazi party agents in 1934.

Following the defeat of the German Reich in 1945 Austria resumed its republican government, after it fully regained its independence from the occupying Allied Powers.

[5] Brigitte Bierlein's cabinet consisted of top civil servants (Spitzenbeamten) [Note 1] and current and retired jurors.

Based on the results of the 29 September 2019 National Council elections, in which the ÖVP emerged as the strongest party, the president asked Sebastian Kurz to form a new coalition government.

[11] Austria's legal system distinguished between three different instruments of direct democracy: referendums (Volksabstimmungen), popular initiatives (Volksbegehren) and national opinion polls (Volksbefragungen).

It finds support from farmers, large and small business owners, and lay Catholic groups, but also from voters without party affiliation, with strongholds in the rural regions of Austria.

[19] The President of Austria accordingly asked ÖVP leader Sebastian Kurz to commence coalition talks to form a new government.

In the 1990s, it started viewing privatisation of nationalised industries more openly, after large losses of state owned enterprises came to light.

It suffered heavy losses in the 2019 National Council elections, ending up with a dozen seats fewer than in the previous legislative session.

[27] In January 2020 the SPÖ received almost 50% of the votes in regional elections in the State of Burgenland under the leadership of Hans Peter Doskozil, which gave him an absolute majority of seats in the Landtag, and allows him to govern without the support of a junior coalition partner.

It expelled its longtime leader H-C Strache, who set up his own party to run in the 2020 Vienna local elections, but failed to reach the 5% threshold to sit in the city parliament.

Some insist on characterizing the Greens as leftists because they are perceived to be anti-capitalist and certainly employ anti-corporate rhetoric and less business friendly policies.

However, this labeling confuses the differences between the Greens—who place a great deal of faith in local markets and direct democracy—and left-Socialists and Communists who tend to favor centralization and planned economies and economic class issues.

The Green Party suffered internal strife and fissure in 2017 and failed to surmount the 4% threshold in the national elections held that year.

Following two months of intense negotiations, Kurz and Green Party leader Werner Kogler announced a coalition agreement on New Year's Day 2020.

In 2013 the LIF made a party alliance with the classic-centre liberal NEOS for the legislative election and entered into the National Council.

A Socialist elder statesman, Dr. Karl Renner, organized an Austrian administration in the aftermath of the war, and general elections were held in November 1945.

The tables turned in 1970, when the SPÖ became the strongest party for the first time, winning an absolute majority under its charismatic leader Bruno Kreisky in 1971.

After major disputes inside the FPÖ between Haider and vice-chancellor Susanne Riess-Passer (the so-called Knittelfeld Putsch), the ÖVP broke the coalition in 2002 and called for re-elections.

In a brilliant marketing move, Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel convinced the then very popular Minister of Finance Karl-Heinz Grasser to change from the FPÖ to the ÖVP.

Not only was the FPÖ publicly blamed for breaking the coalition and had lost Minister Grasser to the ÖVP, their style of government and broken promises also left many of their former voters disillusioned.

Despite being exposed to fierce criticism from the opposition parties for failed or highly unfavorable privatization deals, the highest tax rates and unemployment figures since 1945, a questionable fighter jet purchase and repeated accusations that Finance Minister Grasser may have evaded taxes, the government seems to be the most stable in decades as both parties are afraid of losing votes.

Recent law changes concerning the police, the national television and radio company, the federal railways and the social security system have led to an increase of the ÖVP's and FPÖ's influence in these bodies.

After negotiations with the ÖVP were successfully concluded Alfred Gusenbauer and his SPÖ-ÖVP coalition government were sworn in on 11 January 2007, by President Heinz Fischer.

[40] A week later, Austria's first female-majority cabinet was sworn in and Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, 33, reclaimed the distinction of being the world's youngest head of government.

[42] Following a corruption scandal involving the ruling People's Party, Austria got its third conservative chancellor in two months after Karl Nehammer was sworn into office on 6 December 2021.

[43] State-approved, compulsory-membership chambers of labour, commerce and agriculture, as well as by trade unions and lobbyist groups exercise sometimes significant influence on the Federal Government.