The Greens (Austria)


The Greens – The Green Alternative is a green political party in Austria. The Greens currently sit in opposition. Formerly, they were part of the Schallenberg government, the Second Kurz government, and the Nehammer government. It won 8.2% of votes cast in the 2024 Austrian legislative election. The current President of Austria, Alexander Van der Bellen, is from the Green Party.
The party was founded in 1986 under the name "Green Alternative", following the merger of the more moderate Green party Vereinte Grüne Österreichs, which had its roots in the anti-nuclear power movement and the more progressive party Alternative Liste Österreichs formed by ecology, feminist, peace, Third World and student activists. Since 1993, the party has carried the official name Die Grünen – Die Grüne Alternative , but refers to itself in English as "Austrian Greens". There are still differences between the former members of the old Alternative and VGÖ factions within the party, reflected in the differing approaches of the national and state parties.
Apart from ecological issues such as environmental protection, the Greens are Pro-European and campaign for the rights of minorities and advocate a socio-ecological tax reform. Their basic values according to their charter in 2001 are: "direct democracy, nonviolence, ecology, solidarity, feminism and self-determination". The party is a member of the European Green Party and Global Greens.

History

In 1978 the Austrian Green movement began with the successful campaign to prevent the opening of the Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant. Another major event in the Austrian environmental movement were the sit-in protests in 1984 which prevented the Danube power plant at Hainburg from being built.
The VGÖ and ALÖ contested the 1983 Austrian legislative election, scoring 1.9 and 1.4 percent of the vote each but failing to win any seats. Following this the two parties agreed joint lists for state elections in Salzburg, Tyrol, Voralberg and Styria, although other environmentalist lists also contested elections during this time. The joint lists enjoyed success in Voralberg, achieving 13 percent and four seats in 1984, and Styria, where they won 3.7 percent of the vote and two seats. The immediate catalyst for the merger of the two parties was the candidacy of activist Freda Meissner-Blau in the 1986 Austrian presidential election, in which she won 5.5 percent of the vote. A few months after the election members of the VGÖ and ALÖ, along with journalist, environmentalist and former Socialist Party member Günther Nenning's Citizens' Parliamentary Initiative and other groups to form Green Alternative.
In its early years the party described itself as an alliance of moderate ecologists, former members of the Socialist Party's left unhappy with the leadership of the moderate Franz Vranitzky, peace activists, Eurocommunists, anti-nuclear activists and Christian leftists.

Federal level

In the 1986 parliamentary elections the Green Party started off with 4.82% of all votes cast and entered parliament with eight National Council mandates. In the early elections to National Council in 2002, the Green Party nationwide received 9.47% of votes, and won 17 mandates to the National Council. At that time, it was the highest number of votes garnered by any European Green party.
When the Greens took their seats in parliament for the first time, they chose to appear somewhat unconventional. They initially refused to adapt their behaviour to that of the other parties; an example of this is their refusal to elect a chairperson and designated a puppet made out of straw instead. Delegates would appear in parliament dressed in casual wear such as jeans and trainers. Worldwide attention was drawn when the Green delegate Andreas Wabl hoisted a swastika flag on the speakers podium in the Austrian parliament, protesting against then Federal President Kurt Waldheim. They were also highly active in parliament, proposing 60 pieces of legislation and asking over 400 written questions within 18 months of the Greens' entry to the National Council, more than any other party.
After the national election in 2002, the Greens entered into preliminary negotiations about a possible coalition government with the conservative ÖVP. During negotiations, party leadership was accused of internally black-mailing skeptical members. Negotiations between the two parties were subsequently called off, after the results with the ÖVP were not sufficient. The Green youth organisation Grünalternative Jugend briefly occupied the rooms of the Green parliamentary club in the Austrian parliament building in protest.
In 2003 three Green federal counsellors formed their own club in the Upper House Federal Council of Parliament.
After the 2006 elections the Greens gained four seats and ended up with 21 seats and became the third largest party in Parliament, however did not have enough mandates to form a coalition government with either the Austrian People's Party or Social Democratic Party and became the largest opposition party, while the SPÖ and ÖVP formed a grand coalition government.
The party suffered from internal struggles in 2017, losing its Youth wing and later experiencing a split of Peter Pilz's faction, forming the Peter Pilz List.
The 2017 legislative election saw a collapse for the party, scoring only 3.8% and losing its representation in the Nationalrat for the first time since 1986. Following the results, party spokesman Ingrid Felipe resigned from her post and was replaced by Werner Kogler.
The party saw a revival in the 2019 European election, in which they scored 14.1% and elected 2 MEPs. The election saw the collapse of JETZ.
The party eventually later this year, experienced a strong recovery and performed better well leading up to the 2019 snap legislative election, the Greens returned to the National Council with their best ever result in a legislative election, scoring 13.9% and electing 26 MPs, an upswing of 10.2% from 2017.
In the 2024 Austrian legislative election, the party lost 10 seats and fell to 8.2%. The party was not included in the initial coalition negotiations between the ÖVP, SPÖ and NEOS.

Chairpersons since 1986

The chart below shows a timeline of the Green chairpersons and the Chancellors of Austria. The left green bar shows all the chairpersons of the Green party, and the right bar shows the corresponding make-up of the Austrian government at that time. The red, black, and light grey colours correspond to which party led the federal government. The last names of the respective chancellors are shown, the Roman numeral stands for the cabinets.

ImageSize = width:450 height:500
PlotArea = width:400 height:440 left:50 bottom:50
Legend = columns:3 left:50 top:25 columnwidth:65
DateFormat = yyyy
Period = from:1986 till:2026
TimeAxis = orientation:vertical
ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:2 start:1986
  1. there is no automatic collision detection,
  2. so shift texts up or down manually to avoid overlap
Colors=
id:Grüne value:green legend:Grüne
id:SPÖ value:red legend:SPÖ
id:ÖVP value:gray legend:ÖVP
id:Ind value:gray legend:Independent
Define $dx = 25 # shift text to right side of bar
Define $dy = -4 # adjust height
PlotData=
width:25 mark: align:left fontsize:S shift:
bar:Chair.
color:Grüne
from:1986 till:1988 text:Freda Meissner-Blau
from:1988 till:1992 text:Johannes Voggenhuber
from:1992 till:1994 text:Peter Pilz
from:1994 till:1995 text:Madeleine Petrovic
from:1995 till:1997 text:Christoph Chorherr
from:1997 till:2008 text:Alexander Van der Bellen
from:2008 till:2016 text:Eva Glawischnig
from:2015 till:2017 text: Ingrid Felipe
from:2017 till:2025 text: Werner Kogler
from:2025 till:end text: Leonore Gewessler
bar:Govern.
color:SPÖ
from:1986 till:1987 text:Vranitzky I
from:1987 till:1990 text:Vranitzky II
from:1990 till:1994 text:Vranitzky III
from:1994 till:1996 text:Vranitzky IV
from:1996 till:1997 text:Vranitzky V
from:1997 till:2000 text:Klima
from:2007 till:2008 text:Gusenbauer
from:2008 till:2013 text:Faymann I
from:2013 till:2016 text:Faymann II
from:2016 till:2017 text: Kern
color:ÖVP
from:2000 till:2003 text:Schüssel I
from:2003 till:2007 text:Schüssel II
from:2017 till:2019 text: Kurz I
from:2020 till:2021 text: Kurz II
from:2021 till:2021 text: Schallenberg
from:2021 till:2025 text: Nehammer
from:2025 till:end text: Stocker
color:Ind
from:2019 till:2020 text: Bierlein

Federal state level

The Green party also entered the parliaments or assemblies of Austrian federal states and communal governments. Following is an analysis of the party on the federal state level:

Burgenland

Green Alternative first stood in state elections in Burgenland in 1987, taking 2.2 percent of the vote but no seat. The Greens first entered the Burgenland state parliament in 2000, receiving 5.49% of the vote and winning two seats.
In the 2025 Burgenland state election, the party won 5.66% of the vote and held on to their two seats. After swift negotiations, the Greens entered a governing coalition with the Social Democrats, making Burgenland the only Austrian federal state to be governed by the Greens.

Carinthia

In the southernmost federal state Carinthia, different Green parties ran state elections: the KEL/AL in 1984, Anderes Kärnten in 1989 and 1994, and Demokratie 99 in 1999. These parties were, however, never able to enter the federal state assembly, since the Carinthian voting system requires a party to win a direct mandate in one of the four regional election districts, which effectively means a 10%-threshold in order to enter.

Only in 2004 were the Carinthian Greens finally able to take their seats in the federal state assembly, where they are represented by cabaret artist Rolf Holub and Barbara Lesjak. On a regional level, for example in the federal state capital Klagenfurt, the Carinthian Greens have already played a political role for a longer time. In the Klagenfurt city council, the Greens are represented by Andrea Wulz, Matthias Koechl, Angelika Hoedl and Reinhold Gasper. Since the local election in 2003, the Klagenfurt Greens were able to take one of nine seats in the proportional city-government, Andrea Wulz is the town councillor for issues relating to women, family matters and social housing projects.