Why Austria's Anti-Immigrant Experiment Is Worth Watching

The new Austrian government, announced last weekend, will be watched vigilantly by its European neighbors because it includes the far-right Freedom Party -- and because, thanks to its presence, Austria will become the first Western European country to implement an unapologetically right-wing immigration policy. Its 180-page coalition agreement could set the tone for similarly draconian policies (and unusual coalitions) in other European Union member states and the wider Western world.

The link-up between the center-right People's Party, led by 31-year-old Sebastian Kurz, and the anti-immigrant Freedom Party owes its existence to Kurz's decision that Austrians were tired of milquetoast centrist policies pursued by "grand coalitions" of the People's Party with the Social Democrats. Kurz, whose government career began with the integration portfolio, decided to talk to Freedom Party leader Heinz-Christian Strache rather than his party's traditional center-left partners and rivals. Strache, with a history of neo-Nazi ties and strongly anti-EU leanings, agreed to state unequivocally that Austria would not try to secede from the EU or drop the euro and subscribed to traditional center-right policies like keeping down the national debt. In exchange for going along with Kurz on the economy and on Europe, he received the foreign minister's post and control over the security bloc of the government, including the interior and defense ministries. But perhaps more importantly, the Freedom Party got a mainstream imprimatur on its immigration policy.