Journalists and populists in Austria: In the duration clinch

Independent and critical media have made it very difficult in Austria. You do your Job - to the Annoyance of the right-wing populist FPÖ and the Chancellor's party, ÖVP. The fight back violently.

By Srdjan Govedarica, ARD Studio Vienna

Populist parties and independent journalism are to each other as fire and water. The former rely on emotional escalation, and simple answers. Journalists are merely an annoyance. Your task is to break down complex topics in detail, so that the audience is able to develop their own opinions.

It is no wonder, then, that populism and quality journalism are to each other in the duration of the clinch. So also in Austria. The rights of the FPÖ with ruled since December of 2017, and has created in its communication strategy, a kind of parallel world. Messages are placed on the loved one through their own channels, on the FPÖ-TV, a party-affiliated online magazine, Facebook pages of prominent politicians and tabloids. This is handy, because here nobody asks critical questions and Black-and-White Thinking is decomposed into shades of gray.

Armin Wolf is one of the most famous journalists of the country, and must fight against fierce hostility.

the Finger in the wound

just the journalists but. Example: Armin Wolf. He moderated the ZiB2, the Austrian daily topics, and is one of the most popular journalists in the country. Wolf is known for his Interviews, painstakingly prepare, and to ask the tough questions. FPÖ-politicians in these Interviews regularly to Swim. Your answer is often in handle of the front Alan: So FPÖ leader and Vice-Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache wrote at the beginning of 2018 in the case of Facebook: "There is a place to be in the lie news. This is the ORF".

In the small print refers Strache explicitly on wolf's Facebook profile. Later Strache had to publicly apologize for it.

As it was, according to press reports on Compounds of the FPÖ to the so-called Identitarian movement uncomfortable, said a FPÖ-politicians that "editors will be crying" because the FPÖ'm going to sue you. These are just a few examples, hardly a week goes by without the FPÖ critical reporting as a lie or as a - very popular image: "left-left Propaganda" defamed.

fear of loss of control

It is not only the FPÖ, which behaves in dealing with independent journalism problematic. The Chancellor's party, ÖVP pays attention meticulously as to what you communicated. "Message Control" is the name of the and a number of communication experts at the Vienna Ballhausplatz are busy, government messages unfiltered to the choice to bring people. Here, too, journalism is throwing Sand in the gearbox.

And also ÖVP-personnel loses in such cases, the composure. As a media Minister Gernot Blümel in the ORF TV recently, a half-baked approach to the identification obligation on the Internet to explain to the Moderator, asked critical questions, countered the Minister, with the sentence: "It is nonsense, what are you talking about".