HISTORY THEN AND NOW
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political situation in Austria, and wrote about widespread anti-Semitism.
As you can imagine, as a representative of Austria in this country, I was not
very happy to read that and nei ther were our ambassador and other friends.
My question is
to
Professor Wistrich. As a specialist in anti-Semitism and
modern European history, do you agree with this assessment by the
New
York Times?
How does anti-Semitism in Austria compare with the degree
of anti-Semitism in other central or western European countries such as
France, or the U.S.?
Robert Wistrich:
There was an attempt to gauge the level of anti-Semitic
atti tudes in those countries, ini tiated by the American Jewish Commi ttee. I
seem to recall that these studies were made in 1991 through 1995. I think
they show that Austria scores fairly high on the scale, but somewhere
between the western and eastern European norms. That is to say, more anti–
Semitic than Britain or Holland, less so than Poland or Slovakia-much as
one would expect. Such empirical research is useful but limited in value. It
does give a snapshot of attitudes at a given moment, in response to questions
that might be asked in many different ways but rarely do more than scratch
the surface.
It
is impossible to deny that in the twentieth century Austria has
had a very robust tradition of anti-Semitism. I think this has been somewhat
attenuated in the last twenty years, with the exception of the Waldheim
affair-which certainly did lead to a temporary rise in anti-Jewish feelings.
In a country where you had a significant proportion of people who had
been implicated as members of the Nazi party and had been active anti–
Semites in the 1930s and during the Holocaust, it is not surprising that
anti-Semitism remained fairly high after the war. On the other hand, it was
never officially a part of the state ideology or the program of the main polit–
ical parties, after 1945. Anti-Semitism festered and it wasn't dealt with
properly for a long time. The Waldheim affair paradoxically had a number of
positive consequences: it led to a direct confrontation of the problem and I
think that once Austria gave up its syndrome of denial, it was better able to
face this dark aspect of its past. There is certainly evidence that Austrian cul–
tural and political organizations have been making sincere efforts to correct
what was not done in an earlier period. I think that there is some room for
optimism. Austria is today rather similar to other European countries, where
xenophobia in the general sense is strong but Jews are no longer its prima–
ry target. This is another respect, though less sympathetic, in which Jews are
better off than they've ever been previously, whether
in
the U.S. or in
Europe. Populist xenophobia is flourishing, but I don't think anti-Semitism
is currently higher in Austria than in neighboring countries.
Edith Kurzweil:
I could second this comment on a purely subjective
basis. I've gone back to Vienna many times, for many years. Something
