In a survey of antisemitic attitudes in Austria, 31% of the 2,000 respondents agreed with statements that the poll’s authors said exemplified anti-Jewish biases — a significant drop in that sentiment from a similar study in 2018.
The Austrian government commissioned the survey from the Institute for Empirical Social Studies and presented the results on Friday.
In the 2018 study, 46% of respondents agreed with the statements on anti-Semitic biases and 49% responded in ways that suggested the absence of anti-Semitic bias, Wolfgang Sobotka, president of the National Council of Austria, the lower house of the country’s parliament, said at a news conference in Vienna.
The survey, titled “Austria — Antisemitism 2020 study — results analysis,” included statements such as “Jews today try to take advantage of the fact that they were victims during the Nazi era” (28% agreed) and “Jews have too much influence in Austria” (11%).
The findings of the government-funded surveys showed a significantly higher prevalence of antisemitism than previous polling by the Anti-Defamation League. In its 2014 and 2019 surveys in Austria for the Global 100 Index, the prevalence of antisemitic opinions was 28% and 20% respectively.
In the ADL index, Austria was among the countries with the highest prevalence of antisemitic attitudes in Western Europe. Its index rating was higher than the regional rate of 24% and much higher than in countries with low rates of antisemitism, such as the Netherlands (5%) and the United Kingdom (8%). The ADL rating for the United States was 9%.