Changing Civic Spaces in the Light of Authoritarian Elements of Politics and the Covid Crisis – The Case of Austria

Abstract

The paper analyzes changing civic spaces in Austrian civil society. Different levels of authoritarian politics in different phases of the last 8 years – the recent phase intertwined with the Covid-19 crisis – are analysed in terms of their impact on civil society frameworks. Empirically, the paper draws on three studies completed in 2014, 2019 and 2021. The results shed light on the complex interplay between civil society and the government. Specifically, they show the steps towards authoritarian governing of early state autocrats related to civil society, in particular the often-unspectacular elements that together form a clear pattern of civil society capture and changing civic spaces. Further, they show both the vulnerability of civil society regarding framework conditions – e.g. posed by the pandemic – and politics but also its strategies of resilience.