Identitäre Bewegung Österreichs

The Identitarian Movement of Austria (German: Identitäre Bewegung Österreichs, IBÖ) is an Austrian far-right organization. Inspired by the French Bloc identitaire, it belongs to the pan-European Identitarian movement.

The organization has been described as racist, völkisch, muslimophobic, homophobic and americanophobic. It has been categorized as being part of the overall Neue Rechte movement by several government agencies and NGOs, including the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Counterterrorism and the Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance; likewise, close ties to several irredentist Burschenschaften and the neo-Nazi scene have been thoroughly documented.^[2][3][4][5]

The current spokesman of the IBÖ is Alexander Markovics.

Ideology

The IBÖ opposes liberalism, internationalism, Islam and Islamism, multiculturalism and the melting pot model, instead advocating for ethnopluralism and white separatism. Disapproving of everything they consider being rooted in American imperialism, they oppose Austria's NATO partnership as well as the international sanctions against Russia. Economically, they reject capitalism, communism and socialism in favor of essentialist Third Way economics, promoting a syncretic approach to anti-capitalist and anti-globalist politics and favoring an independent alliance of sovereign nation states with Russia. On their website and Facebook page, they cite the works of Aleksandr Dugin, Dominique Venner, and Alain de Benoist as major influences.

Activities

• In February 2013, nine members of the IBÖ attempted a counter-occupation of the Viennese Votive Church that had previously been occupied by refugees to protest living conditions within the government-owned and privately administrated refugee camps they've been assigned to. They were arrested and escorted off the premises by SWAT officers several hours later following the pastor's request for police assistance.^[6]
• On November 10, 2013, the IBÖ briefly occupied a balcony of the Fundamental Rights Agency until police officers arrived to escort them off the premises.^[7]
• On May 17, 2014, the IBÖ attempted to stage another rally in Vienna's main shopping mile Mariahilfer Straße. Despite having been provided with a protective detail by the Federal Police, they were unable to gain access to their planned route as a result of a considerably larger anti-racist counter demonstration. While interaction between the two demonstrations was minimal and largely restricted to a verbal level, State Director Gerhard Pürstl received heavy criticism from both activist groups and national media outlets over the use of heavy-handed riot control tactics. 37 anti-racist protesters were arrested; a banner that Federal Police officers confiscated from a group of activists was later put on display on the IBÖ's website.^[8]
• On April 14, 2016, a group of roughly 40 IBÖ activists illegally gained access to the University of Vienna's Audimax lecture hall while a play by the Jewish playwright and novelist Elfriede Jelinek was being performed by refugee actors, showering the audience and actors with fake blood while documenting the incident photographically. Attendants of the play report being physically attacked by IBÖ members, although the IBÖ categorically denies accusations of engaging in political violence. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and Counterterrorism reports a total of eight charges of assault with grievous bodily harm filed by both members of the audience and IBÖ activists, which are being processed;^[9] the Federal Police has dropped all felony charges and announced that it is merely investigating the possibility of an unlawful public disturbance.^[10]

See also

• Ethnopluralism
• Identity politics
• Dark Enlightenment

External links

• Report on the IBÖ by the Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance (in German)
• Official website of the IBÖ (in German)
• Official Facebook page of the IBÖ (in German)

Media

• 

  IBÖ rally, Vienna, November 10, 2013.

References