Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T04:12:02.498Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 36 - Political Violence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 October 2020

Get access

Summary

THERE IS BROAD CONSENSUS that the First Republic—and with it Red Vienna—failed because of the violent conflicts between political camps, above all between the Christian Socials and the Social Democrats. Historian Gerhard Botz compiled a “Timeline of Acts of Political Violence,” which is by no means comprehensive, although it lists 242 incidents occurring between November 12, 1918, and February 11, 1934. These incidents— motivated, with few exceptions, by domestic political objectives—led to deaths, serious injuries, and a substantial number of minor injuries, and included coup attempts, riots, clashes, assassination attempts, and attacks.

Alongside political motives, it was the political actors—either directly or indirectly involved—who gave the individual acts of violence their political dimension. There were paramilitary groups, in particular the Heimwehr, which united Christian Socials as well as Pan-Germans, and the Republican Protection League (Republikanischer Schutzbund), controlled by the Social Democrats. Later came the SA and the SS. Individual actors also contributed to political violence. Walter Riehl, for example, was a Viennese lawyer whose allegiance vacillated between the National Socialist and Christian Social parties. Riehl represented in court not only the Schattendorf shooters but also the murderers of the writer Hugo Bettauer and the man responsible for a failed assassination attempt on Vienna Mayor Karl Seitz. What all of these groups and individuals had in common was that they fundamentally challenged the state's monopoly on the use of force.

Latent violence represents just as much of a provocation as overt violence when it comes to the state's monopoly on the use of force. Many a political activist has wished death on a political opponent. “We will not truly have won until the head of this Asian rolls onto the sand.” This is what Ernst Rüdiger Starhemberg, newly appointed federal leader of the Heimwehr, had to say about Hugo Breitner, Red Vienna's city councilor of finance, in October 1930. The Vienna-born Breitner had his Jewish heritage—and Starhemberg's outspoken anti-Semitism—to thank for the fact that he was transformed into an Asian in Starhemberg's violent fantasy. It is not fantasy, however, but the potential to implement that fantasy that characterizes latent violence.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Boydell & Brewer
Print publication year: 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×