More than average

Corona pandemic still moves FPÖ voters

The coronavirus pandemic is less important as an election issue than often thought - but the topic still mobilizes FPÖ voters in particular.

(Bild: APA/GEORG HOCHMUTH)

The coronavirus pandemic played a lesser role as an election motive than often assumed - yet the topic remains relevant for FPÖ voters. In the National Council elections last September, 34% of FPÖ voters stated that they had frequently talked about coronavirus during the election campaign - twice as many as the average of all eligible voters. 

However, other topics have been at the forefront of almost every election since 2021, in particular inflation and, most recently, immigration.

Foresight, together with the Institute for Strategic Analysis (ISA), evaluates which topics are discussed particularly frequently in the election campaign for each election. The pandemic only made it to first place twice - in the state elections in Vienna in 2020 and Upper Austria in 2021.

Graphic: Proportion of voters who discussed the coronavirus pandemic "very frequently" during the election campaign

In the latter case, 46% of voters stated that they had discussed the pandemic very frequently during the election campaign. Among blue supporters, the figures were 51% and 55% respectively.

In 2021, the FPÖ had already completed its hard turn in coronavirus policy: At the beginning of the pandemic, party leader Herbert Kickl had still called for a hard lockdown to contain it. From April 2020, however, the FPÖ then launched a populist campaign against the measures associated with the pandemic, which continues to this day.

Graphic: Corona waves since mid-2023

Inflation replaced top issue
The Blue Party was able to stop the rise of the coronavirus-sceptic MFG party. However, other topics dominated the election day polls in the 2022 Tyrolean state elections. "Inflation and rising prices" have been at the top of the list of issues in five out of seven elections since then, including the National Council election. Immigration was the most discussed topic in the EU elections and the Vorarlberg regional elections.

Return to "normal elections"
For election researcher Julia Partheymüller from the University of Vienna, the National Council election, with the FPÖ winning the election for the first time, was therefore more of a return to "normal elections". In her view, the real outlier was the 2019 national election with the fall of the FPÖ following the Ibiza scandal. Now the "return migration movement" has taken place.

Covid in Austria

• Between 2020 and 2023, 23,390 people officially died from Covid-19 in Austria. The mortality rate was particularly high in winter 2020. In addition, 4304 deaths were registered in which Covid was considered a concomitant disease but not the direct cause of death.

• The population in FPÖ strongholds ignored the containment measures more frequently - with corresponding health consequences. Districts with a higher proportion of FPÖ voters recorded more Covid deaths in the second wave of infections (i.e. after the blue corona wave) than districts with fewer FPÖ supporters.

The issue is still important to some FPÖ voters, as 34% of FPÖ voters stated in the last National Council election that they had discussed coronavirus very frequently during the election campaign. This puts the topic in eighth place on the blue list of issues, but almost on a par with the economy and ahead of pensions.