Tony Bennett, Differing diversities - Council of Europe

Differing diversitiesGovernmental and constitutional provision for diversityThe rights of two of the recognised ethnic groups, the Croats in Burgenland andthe Slovenes in Carinthia, were constitutionally enshrined in the Austrian StateTreaty of 1955 which resulted from the negotiations held between the Austriangovernment and the allied forces on the subject of Austria’s independence. Thetreaty, however, did not mention the rights of any other existing ethnic groups. Thedegree to which such provisions – focusing on such matters as language andschooling rights, and bilingual place names and road signs – have been honouredin practice has also proved variable. Often opposed by the German-speakingmajorities at the provincial level, the federal government has also often failed tostand by these constitutional guarantees, frequently occasioning significant protestas a consequence. The new law of 1976 – the Volksgruppengesetz, or EthnicGroups Act – has been seen as diluting the provisions of the 1955 treaty by theCarinthian Slovenes and Burgenland Croats and, as a consequence, has been contestedon a number of occasions. However, it has also been welcomed by other ethnicgroups – the Hungarians in Burgenland, for example, who had not previouslyenjoyed any specific legal provisions. There is no equivalent provision for the culturalrights of immigrants who also lack political rights and experience variousforms of discrimination in the labour and housing markets, and in the delivery ofsocial services. While questions concerning the need to rectify this situation wereraised in the so-called “foreigners debate” of the 1990s, there has been only limitedimprovement in the formal rights of immigrants and there is currently considerableconcern that their situation might deteriorate.Cultural policy and cultural diversityThe history of cultural policy formation in Austria is characterised by two distinctivefeatures: the unusually strong role of the state in cultural provision comparedto the private sector; and the relative strength of the federal government in planningcultural policy even though, legally, “cultural sovereignty” is vested in theprovincial governments. Characterised, in the immediate post-war period, by aconservative and limited focus on high culture, cultural policies acquired significantnew directions in the 1970s. In response to the concerns of new social movements,there was a significant democratisation of the cultural sphere through thedevelopment of cultural policies that were intended to overcome barriers to culturalaccess based on relations of social class and gender. The 1990s also witnesseda major public debate about “cultural citizenship” in Austria whichincluded a significant concern with questions of cultural diversity. This resulted ina blossoming of regional cultural initiatives directed mainly toward the culturalactivities of the different Volksgruppen and, in the media sphere, in the experimentin media diversity (public broadcasting in Austria is a strongly centrally directedstate monopoly) represented by the innovative “free radios” which are also platformsfor immigrant communities. The stance toward immigrant groups, however,remained largely an integrationist one although new directions with a moreexplicit stress on the promotion of cultural diversity were outlined in the WhitePaper on the Reform of Cultural Policy in Austria that resulted from a review and34