Austria witnessed a historical election day. Never before there were such dramatic changes of election results.
The ÖVP (People's Party) won 15,36 percentage points, the FPÖ (Freedom Party) lost 16,75 percentage points. This led to a radical realignment of the political forces within the so called civil camps. The ÖVP became the strongest party, the SPÖ (Social Democrats) was beaten into second place for the first time since 1966, while the FPÖ lost more than the half of her votes. The Greens stayed as the fourth strongest party in parliament with only one percentage point less than the FPÖ.
Now the SPÖ and the ÖVP together had 148 members of parliament to their disposal, 26 MP's more than they had needed for a constitutional majority of 122 MP's.
Although the election campaign was characterised by a neck-and-neck race of ÖVP and SPÖ, the ÖVP finally succeeded by centering its election campaign on the candidate for the chancellorship. Their increase in votes came mostly from former FPÖ voters. But the ÖVP was also able to win somewhat more votes from the SPÖ and the Greens than they lost to them. In the end, the mobilisation of 122.000 non-voters from 1999 led to the ÖVP's substantial increase in votes. The ÖVP strategically benefited from the FPÖ's crisis of leadership: the vice-chancellor Susanne Riess-Passer and the minister of finance Karl-Heinz-Grasser were praised. At the same time the ÖVP successfully dissociated itself from Jörg Haider and the "Rebells of Knittelfeld". The ÖVP positioned herself with FPÖ-topics like asylum politics and the warning of a possible Red-Green-Coalition. The ÖVP cleverly took advantage of the FPÖ's leadership crisis. After the first FPÖ leadership crisis ("Rebellion of Knittelfeld", resignations of Riess-Passer, Grasser and Westenthaler) the ÖVP announced new elections and were able to win many Freedom party voters. After the second leadership crisis (drop out of Reichhold due to illness, takeover of the party's leadership by Haupt and Jörg Haider's newest visit to Irak) the ÖVP presented Karl-Heinz Grasser as a potential member of government and thereby enforced the voters' flow from the FPÖ to the ÖVP in the closing election campaign. Reasons for the exodus of FPÖ voters to the ÖVP:
The SPÖ was beaten into second place in Austria, even though she gained nearly 200.000
votes. Above all the SPÖ was successful within the following three topics: social policy, fight of unemployment and prevention of an ÖVP-FPÖ government.
Alfred Gusenbauer was increasingly perceived as a suitable candidate for chancellorship (45% in the election day poll). However, Alfred Gusenbauer's image not adequate enough to overtake Wolfgang Schüssel, whose image increased during the intense election campaign as well. With the presentation of Wolfgang Petritsch and Josef Broukal, the SPÖ successfully achieved two effects: mobilising voters and improving the image of the candidate for chancellorship.
During the final stage of the election campaign the SPÖ increased its positive perception with the performance of its number one candidate at TV confrontations.
At the national elections in 1999 most of the voters younger than 30 years had voted for the FPÖ. Now the FPÖ came only fourth among young people. With this election the FPÖ lost above all in the group of the 60 year old voters. Now 44 % of all FPÖ voters are older than 60.
Within the group of voters younger than 35 and with a high-school diploma, the Greens gained 27 % of the valid votes. They profited from the structural change, because this group of voters is ever increasing.
The main motives to vote for the Greens were ecological and human rights topics and the popularity of Alexander Van der Bellen. The Greens increased their share of votes among the government opponents and the FPÖ critics. Many of the new voters for the Greens wanted them to come in third and become part of a coalition government. Most of all the Greens profited from the dissolving of the Liberal Forum.
The Greens remained virtually unchanged in rural communities, whereas the SPÖ slightly gained votes. Both parties, however, were rather successful in urban areas.
In the final stage of the election campaign, the negative campaigning of the ÖVP against a possible red-green coalition produced the desired effects and strengthened the positions of both ÖVP and FPÖ. After the elections in Germany, a possible red-green coalition was still preferred over a black-blue coalition. Two weeks before the election this lead had risen to 8 %, but the preference for red-green then sank 8 % during the these last two weeks.
With a surplus of 15,4 percentage points the ÖVP (People's Party) achieved the first place. In contrast, the FPÖ (Freedom Party), with immense losses of 16,9 percentage points, landed in third place closely ahead of the Greens.
The SPÖ (Social Democrats) improved its election results of 1999 by 3,3 percentage points, the Greens by about 2,1 percentage points.
This national election was dominated by the radical shift of 633.000 FPÖ voters to the ÖVP. 148.000 FPÖ voters shifted to the SPÖ, who in turn lost only 14.000 voters to the FPÖ.
The strong mobilisation of non-voters is second most important phenomenon of this election. This resulted from the dramatisation of the Lager campaigns in the final stage just before the election. 129.000 non-voters of 1999 wandered to the ÖVP, 123.000 for the SPÖ, 88.000 non-voters of 1999 shifted to the Greens, while 76.000 non-voters this time voted for the FPÖ.
The Greens lost more voters to the ÖVP (40.000) than they won from them (14.000). The voter transition between the Greens and the SPÖ is relatively well-balanced: whereas 24.000 SPÖ voters shifted to the Greens, 27.000 Green voters shifted to the SPÖ.
Former voters of the Liberals mainly shifted to the ÖVP (50.000) and to the Greens (61.000). The migration between the camps in comparison to the displacement within the civic camps was relatively low. 234.000 voters shifted from the right to the left, in turn 124.000 voters shifted from the left to the right which led to a surplus of 110.00 votes for the two left parties.
| SPÖ '02 | FPÖ '02 | ÖVP '02 | Greens '02 | LIF '02 | Others '02 | Non-Voters '02 | Total '99 |
SPÖ '99 | 1441 | 14 | 24 | 24 | 5 | 5 | 16 | 1529 |
FPÖ '99 | 148 | 366 | 633 | 21 | 7 | 4 | 70 | 1247 |
ÖVP '99 | 12 | 12 | 1189 | 14 | 4 | 2 | 11 | 1244 |
Greens 99 | 27 | 10 | 40 | 246 | 4 | 2 | 14 | 341 |
LIF '99 | 19 | 7 | 50 | 61 | 13 | 1 | 12 | 161 |
Others '99 | 23 | 7 | 14 | 11 | 5 | 17 | 15 | 92 |
Non voters '99 | 123 | 76 | 129 | 88 | 10 | 6 | 866 | 1297 |
Total '02 | 1792 | 4491 | 2077 | 465 | 48 | 36 | 1003 |
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E.g.: 1.441.000 SPÖ voters of 1999 voted again for the SPÖ, 14.000 for the FPÖ, 24.000 for the ÖVP,...
| SPÖ '02 | FPÖ '02 | ÖVP '02 | Greens '02 | LIF '02 | Others '02 | Non-voters '02 | Total '99 |
SPÖ '99 | 94% | 1% | 2% | 2% | 0% | 0% | 1% | 100% |
FPÖ '99 | 12% | 29% | 51% | 2% | 1% | 0% | 6% | 100% |
ÖVP '99 | 1% | 1% | 96% | 1% | 0% | 0% | 1% | 100% |
Greens '99 | 8% | 3% | 12% | 72% | 1% | 1% | 4% | 100% |
LIF '99 | 11% | 4% | 31% | 38% | 8% | 1% | 8% | 100% |
Others '99 | 25% | 8% | 15% | 12% | 6% | 18% | 16% | 100% |
Non voters '99 | 10% | 6% | 10% | 7% | 1% | 0% | 67% | 100% |
E.g.: 94% of SPÖ voters of 1999 voted again for the SPÖ, 1% for the FPÖ, 2% for the ÖVP,...