Implicit boycott: The call for patriotic consumption in interwar Austria

Transcription

MANAGEMENT & ORGANIZATIONAL HISTORY Vol 5(2): 165–195
DOI: 10.1177/1744935910361649
© The Author(s), 2010. Reprints and permissions: http://www.sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
http://moh.sagepub.com
M&OH
Implicit boycott: The call for patriotic
consumption in interwar Austria
Oliver Kühschelm
Universität Wien
Abstract
In 1927 entrepreneurs’ associations and the Ministry ofTrade started the ‘Buy Austrian
Goods’ working group, which deployed a broad array of propaganda activities. It was
moulded after similar initiatives in other countries, above all the Swiss Week and the
British Empire Marketing Board. As with Switzerland and the UK, Austria pursued a
free trade policy. Protectionist measures seemed out of question, but an effort at educating consumers should help to overcome the endemic trade deficit. The working
group emphasized the defensive nature of its propaganda, claiming not to instigate a
boycott of foreign products. But neither the rhetoric nor the administrative measures
promoted by the working group were always devoid of aggressiveness. Consumers
were told to act as responsible citizens, to contribute to the reduction of unemployment by shopping Austrian. Yet, the appeal to state consciousness was thwarted by
the ambivalent feelings towards a state that in the eyes of many Austrians was no
viable alternative to unification with Germany.
Key words • buycott • citizen-consumer • corporatism • national identity • propaganda
• protectionism • trade policy • unemployment
‘By no means we can speak about a movement that might get out of hand into a boycott
of foreign products’ assured an article in Die Industrie, the organ of the Federation of
Austrian Industry (Hauptverband der Industrie Österreichs), reacting to a critique
uttered by the Kölnische Zeitung when the initiative was having its start in autumn
1927.1 At a press conference on 8 July 1927, when presenting the initiative to the
public, Friedrich Tilgner, the president of the Viennese Chamber of Commerce,2 the
other leading institutional partner in the ‘Buy Austrian goods’ venture, had explained,
with a side blow to a Hungarian movement of the first decade of the 20th century:
‘The movement that we want to initiate should not be chauvinistic in the mould of
the “Tulip movement”. We do not wish to ban all foreign goods from the Austrian
market’.3 ‘Not a word about a boycott of foreign goods!’ concluded the introduction
of a teacher brochure published in 1934, one of the major publications of the initiative.4
Statements in the same vein can be found during the whole life span of ‘Buy Austrian
goods’, at all levels of communication: press conferences, newspaper articles, internal
communication with participating organizations as well as external correspondence.
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MANAGEMENT & ORGANIZATIONAL HISTORY 5(2)
So if this was the mantra of ‘Buy Austrian Goods’, it might seem dubious that an
article about the call for patriotic consumption in the Austria of the 1920s and 1930s
fits in the frame of a special issue on boycott. In order to show how it is related to the
general topic we have to sketch the field in which the call to buy Austrian was set and
outline what shape such a call may take on. First, it may highlight preference of domestic
products or else put the emphasis on urging not to consume foreign products. Both
aspects are but two sides of one coin, although it is highly relevant to determine if the
campaign moves more into the direction of a boycott, that is not buying foreign goods,
or if it is more in line of what may be designated a ‘buycott’,5 the urge to purchase a
determined set of ‘good’ products, in our case of national origin.
A main objective of this article will be to show that the idea of an outright boycott
of imported goods lingered just around the corner, although the proponents of ‘Buy
Austrian Goods’ made quite an effort to keep it there: around the corner. Present but
not quite; whenever the word boycott was mentioned it signified an economic option
that was not to be exercised, above all because of fear of retaliation by commercial
partners. ‘Boycott’ drew a line that should not be crossed, but thereby it played a crucial
role for defining the goal and the instruments of the initiative.
Although the dialectic relation of buycott and boycott is a fundamental aspect
of the ‘Buy Austrian’ campaign (the same probably holds true for any buy-national
initiative), some additional variables must be taken into consideration to understand
its specific nature: a call to buy national can limit itself to propaganda, that is verbal
and visual mass media communication, but it can also involve physical action, for
example deploying sentinels at the doors of non-national shopkeepers in order to prevent customers from entering. And it can go as far as to administrative measures if it
has the backing of government agencies. Apart from that a buy-national campaign can
be a grass roots movement or a movement launched by corporate bodies; it can be
mostly or entirely private or run by the state. If the latter is the case and if it includes
administrative measures, the question of patriotic consumption is closely connected to
the discussion and the enforcement of a typical set of protectionist measures such as
tariffs, quota, and the like. It is against the backdrop of these different possibilities
that we have to analyse the ‘Buy Austrian’ campaign. Furthermore, there is a crucial
problem any buy-national initiative has to deal with if it aspires to attain credibility
among its fellow citizens: highly heterogeneous interests of diverse social and economic actors have to be integrated into an organization that pretends to act on behalf
of the common national good.
Shopping decisions are at the heart of a buy-national campaign. The call to buy
Austrian relied on assumptions about the consumer, his or her interests, his or her readiness to act as consumer-patriots. Talking about the consumer, we have to admit that this
is very large notion. It encompasses people from different social strata and regional background; men and women; children, adults, the elderly; people of different political affiliation and ideological persuasions; Jews, Catholics, Protestants; Austrians with German
mother-tongue and others whose first language was Slovene, Croatian, Hungarian,
Czech; citizens of the Austrian Republic and residents who had opted for the citizenship
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KÜHSCHELM: PATRIOTIC CONSUMPTION IN INTERWAR AUSTRIA
of other successor states of the Monarchy. All these distinctions make good candidates
for variables that affected the individual reception of the call to buy Austrian goods. As
for some of the distinctions, we can show their insertion into the propaganda discourse,
but by saying this we have to acknowledge a limitation of the research. From the sources
that it draws on we mainly get a hold on discursive constructions elaborated by the
protagonists of the campaign. We do not gain direct access to knowledge about how
people reacted to the subject positions offered to them and about how they adapted those
elements to their own needs. There is also little information as to the actual shopping
behaviour of consumers. This already was a worry for those who orchestrated the ‘Buy
Austrian’ campaigns. They made their claim to the effectiveness of the propaganda, but
they did not bring up much convincing data. ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ is not an interesting
topic because it can be proven to have exerted a compelling force on consumers, but
quite the contrary because of its many weaknesses and ambivalences that made the success
of a buy-national campaign especially unlikely.
Interwar Austria was a deeply troubled society that did not succeed in solving its
many political, social, and economic problems. In the revolutionary days of 1918 and
during the brief period of social democratic dominance in 1919 the middle classes lost
much of their previous status because of the democratization of politics. War and
hyperinflation wiped out monetary assets and sharply reduced the purchase power of
what had once been good salaries. On the other hand labour profited from new social
laws, the freeze on rents, and later also from the housing politics of ‘Red Vienna’. Yet,
even in the mid-1920s, in many respects the best years for the First Republic, unemployment remained high. Austria achieved a certain stability, but when the decade
drew to a close, political conflicts were fuelled by economic depression and in the early
1930s the Christian Socialist government turned into an authoritarian regime.
Prior Experience with Nationalist Boycotts
From the times of the Habsburg Empire, Austrian commerce and industry had large
experience with boycotts, mainly as the target of nationalist groups that wished to
battle Austrian German dominance. In the Austrian half of the Monarchy the Slavic
peoples rallied to the call ‘each to his own’. The slogan (‘Svuºj k svému’ in Czech) was
widely used by the Czech national movement,6 which served as a model for Slavic groups
such as the Slovenes in less developed provinces.
The buy-national movements of Czech and Slovenes were orientated against the
state although they could draw on support of local or regional authorities. They subverted the existing state, and this is an important difference to the ‘Buy Austrian’
initiative of the 1920s, which was backed by the state. The Hungarian ‘Tulip movement’ came much closer in this respect.7 As its Slavic counterparts the movement,
which was launched in 1906, directed itself against Austrian German industry and it
likewise presented a conflict within the interior market of the Habsburg Monarchy.
But although the ‘Tulip movement’ was promoted by oppositional political forces it
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could reasonably aspire to the support of government agencies because the Hungarian
State formed a more than uneasy partnership with Cisleithania, the Austrian half of
the Empire. Yet, once the opposition came to power, it quickly turned town the volume
of its former boycott-rhetoric. In one decisive aspect the Tulip movement and the
other pre-war boycott-initiatives differed from ‘Buy Austrian goods’: they were fired
by nationalist ambitions and relied on comparably clear-cut national identities, both
of which was lacking in the Austrian case two decades later.
It is worth noting that Austrian German entrepreneurs, merchants and craftsmen
were far from being only passive objects of nationalist boycotts in the Habsburg
Monarchy. German nationalism also ushered in calls to buy only from good Germans,8
a request that was often accompanied by rampant anti-Semitism, which characterized
the boycott movements on all sides.9 The alert against the Slavic threat remained on
the agenda of German Austrian economic nationalism in the interwar period. For
example the acquisition of Austrian companies by Czechoslovakian competitors
aroused storms of nationalist protest.10 The call to buy only from Christians or Aryans
also survived the break-up of the Empire. Local and regional boycotts against Jewish
businesses stayed to be a part of the social and economic history of Austria.11
The Political and Economic Background
While the other successor states gained something from the break-up of the Habsburg
Empire: emancipation from Vienna, the new Republic of Austria was seen by its elites
as an unfortunate result of the Empire’s disintegration, a process described as ‘demolition’.12 Previous dominance over the Slavic peoples of Cisleithania was gone, the territory had been drastically reduced, and German-nationalist dreams could not find
their fulfilment in an Austrian Republic. Hence, joining the German Reich seemed
to make more sense than ever before. There quickly evolved a broad consensus that the
‘Anschluss’ was badly needed, not least as a cure to the economic difficulties caused
by the loss of a huge interior market.13
Austria indeed had to face severe problems due to the disintegration of the
Empire. New power relations had been established and trade barriers reshaped the former regional division of labour. Among the successor states Austria’s economic structure was the least balanced.14 Vienna had been the administrative and financial centre
of the Monarchy. But the head was now cut off from most parts of its body. So there
were lots of state functionaries whom nobody needed any more and major banks that
desperately, albeit vainly clung to their former influence and were to aggravate the
depression of the 1930s.15 As for the production of iron, metal, locomotives, and cars
Austria – now a small market of 6.5m people – possessed huge excess capacities. Yet,
other industries of vital importance such as sugar and textiles were lacking almost
completely or to an important extent.16 Vienna had always relied on Hungarian food
and on coal from what was now Czechoslovakia, and it continued to do so after the
First World War. The dependence of those provinces that became the Austrian
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Republic on imports from for example Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia, had once been
matched by the selling of finished products. The complementary relations within the
economic texture of the Empire had been seen as happy ones by the Austrian-German
bourgeoisie,17 but this view had not been shared by their upcoming Slav and Hungarian
counterparts, and it was certainly not how the newly formed nation states were thinking
about the matter.18
In the 1920s Austria pursued a markedly liberal foreign trade policy in order to
maintain the industrial structure inherited from the Empire.19 Politicians and business
elites alike were unwilling to accept the fact that the other successor states of the
Habsburg Empire showed no interest whatsoever to let the Austrian industry (or
Austrian banks) play its former role.20 Their goal was strong national economies emancipated from former peripheral positions. So they opted for protectionist policies and
restricted access to their interior markets with the help of high tariff barriers and quotas. In 1925 the average tariff was 18 per cent for goods imported to Austria.21 Austrian
tariffs were comparable to Switzerland, and to Scandinavian countries such as Sweden
and Denmark, but not to its most important trade partners, the successor states, which
then absorbed 43 per cent of Austrian exports.22 Poland had tariffs of 32 per cent,
Czechoslovakia of 29 per cent, Hungary of 27 per cent, and Yugoslavia of 23 per cent.23
A Cautious Move Towards Buy-national Propaganda
In the mid 1920s the Austrian Ministry of Trade wished to do something about the
endemic trade balance deficit but apparently wanted to avoid making a u-turn on foreign
trade policy. It probably seemed the right moment to look for ways of furthering the
sale of goods on the home market, not least because after having lived through hyperinflation and the ensuing stabilization crisis Austria had finally entered a period of
moderate prosperity. In June 1926 the Ministry of Trade suggested to the Viennese
Chamber of Commerce that it thoroughly study the buy-national propaganda measures
of foreign states in order to become clear about the possibilities of adapting them to
Austrian needs.24
There had been a flow of complaints by Austrian companies about the difficulties
they encountered when trying to sell their goods abroad. For example, in April 1926
the ‘Vereinigte Papierwarenfabriken AG’, a paper producer, had informed the Federation
of Austrian Paper Producers that even
England, which has always granted full freedom of trade in every respect, has
been resorting for some time to the slogan ‘Buy only British goods’. North
America advertises in a similar manner national products, and to our dismay
today we have received a letter from the Netherlands where the postal stamp
requests: ‘Use only Dutch products’.25
What had provoked the outrage of the ‘Vereinigte Papierwarenfabriken AG’ was to
be the first propaganda project in the line of strengthening the economic patriotism
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of Austrians: an advertising stamp. The implementation of the idea by the Viennese
Chamber of Commerce showed that it was all but easy to find a common ground even
for a relatively insignificant measure. First of all, business interests were heterogeneous and therefore no particular branch of industry should be mentioned by the
stamp. Furthermore, as the Austrian provinces were notoriously jealous of Vienna this
aspect had also to be taken into account. The Viennese Chamber had made it clear that
the stamp idea meant just following the model furnished by foreign states such as,
among others, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and Sweden. Nevertheless, many participants in the discussion, which started in November 1926, expressed concern about
an excessively outspoken call for economic patriotism. It was feared that this might
engender retaliation by other countries: The ‘Federation of Austrian Exporters’ welcomed the idea of the stamp, provided it did not ask Austrians to buy exclusively
Austrian goods. This would be seen as affecting export interests.26 Likewise, the Salzburg
and the Carinthian Chambers of Commerce warned not to use a stamp that requested
‘Buy only Austrian goods’.27 Also an Austrian version of the slogan ‘British goods are
best’, though considered effective in advertising, was considered out of question. In
the end, without having achieved full consensus, the Viennese Chamber of Commerce
ordered two stamps from the General Directorate of the Austrian Post Office. One
said ‘Buy Austrian goods’ and the other ‘Visit Vienna and Austria’s marvellous Alps’.28
It is important to pay attention to the subtleties of the wording. The omission of the
particle ‘only’ expressed a cautious attitude infused by a general sense of weakness of
‘poor Austria’. Furthermore the reference to Vienna and the Alps was an attempt to
achieve equilibrium between the interests of the capital and its provinces.
The Creation of a Working Group
When considering propaganda on behalf of national goods, the activities of other
countries in this vein were of the greatest interest. Therefore, the Ministry of Trade,
the Chamber of Commerce, and the Federation of Industry gathered a survey of buynational measures sponsored by foreign governments. Maybe the most exciting example was provided by British campaigns. A call to buy Austrian had to be perfectly
legitimate, its proponents suggested, if in the United Kingdom, the ‘stronghold of
free trade’ (Emporium des Freihandels), consumers were asked to mind the national
origins of goods.29 Already in 1911 there had been held an ‘All British Shopping
Week’, albeit without much success in the first place. The dominant perspective in
matters of foreign exchange still was free trade whose significance went well beyond
mere trade policy. It also expressed a liberal concept of the consumer as citizen. But
things changed with the First World War. Patriotic shopping became an increasingly
acceptable idea and in the 1920s there were ever more Empire Shopping Weeks.30 Yet
the British government still refrained from a protectionist turn in trade policy. Instead
of introducing tariff barriers to keep off imports from countries outside the Empire,
in spring 1926 the Empire Marketing Board was created that tried to win over
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consumers to imperial shopping. The board used a broad array of propaganda means
and at its peak it employed about 120 people.31
An example that in many respects came much closer to the situation of the
Austrian Republic was found in the Swiss Week. After the disintegration of the Habsburg
Empire Austria now was what Switzerland had been all along: a small, export oriented
state with a liberal foreign trade regime. The Swiss Week, which had been inspired
by British initiatives, was first organized in 1917 when over 20,000 retail firms participated in the activities. This is a far more impressive number than the one that was
reached by the first Austrian Week 10 years later, but strong national pride among
the Swiss and the special circumstances of World War One, when Switzerland was
partially cut off from the world market, have to be taken into account. The Swiss
Week stressed a sense of national solidarity: the well-being of the national economy is
in the best interest of all citizens, went the argument, which did not leave room for
class conflict. The propaganda was set against the background of increasing cooperation between employers and labour organizations.32
In early 1927 the Austrian Ministry of Trade invited industrial associations, the
Chambers of Commerce, of Agriculture, and of Labour to discuss propaganda on
behalf of Austrian goods. The meeting on 14 February 1927 was well attended, above
all by industrialists. In his opening statement Dr Johann Weinczierl, a high ranking
civil servant at the Ministry of Trade,33 explained: ‘The results of last year’s trade balance have recently drawn the attention of the public to the importance of the interior
market. Therefore it is especially relevant to ask if and in how far in the interest of an
increase of sales on the home-market and therewith a reduction of unemployment in
Austria a systematic propaganda for the preferential use of Austrian made products is
desirable’. Admittedly, the question Weinczierl put forward had already been answered
positively, at least partially, by the mere fact of the meeting which the Ministry of
Trade had organized and which demonstrated its intention to lay the ground for more
systematic measures on behalf of Austrian goods.34
After the initial meeting and another one of a smaller committee,35 a series of over
20 talks with representatives of diverse industry branches followed. Efforts were made
to bridge conflicts between production and trade in order to win over the representatives
of retail and wholesale trade; and more generally sceptics who doubted the efficiency
of ‘Buy Austrian’ propaganda or feared retaliation measures by foreign countries had
to be persuaded.36,37 In the end the ‘Working Group of Economic Bodies ‘Buy Austrian
Goods’’ was formed by the organizations that had already participated in the meeting
on 14 February. A propaganda bureau was set up in the house of the Federation of
Industry and put in charge of one of its employees, Dr Theodor Schneider.38 The daily
business of the working group was to be run by Dr Leo Klemensiewicz from the
Viennese Chamber of Commerce.39 This bi-headed executive reflected who was most
interested in the workgroup.40
The Chamber of Commerce, which had been founded in 1849, traditionally
represented the economic interests of the bourgeoisie. In 1920, Chamber elections
were democratized, but small-scale producers still suspected that the Chambers of
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Commerce, especially the Viennese Chamber, were pandering to big business and
favouring economic liberalism over protectionist measures.41 Industrialists indeed
held leading positions in the Chambers. Nevertheless they preferred the Federation of
Industry, which had been created in 1919, as their instrument of lobbying.42 The
Viennese Chamber of Commerce and the Federation of Industry both maintained close
relations to the Ministry of Trade.43
A look at the budget of the working group for 1927 confirms its nature as a joint
venture of the Chamber of Commerce and the Federation of Industry, sponsored by the
Ministry of Trade, which otherwise thought it prudent to keep in the background.
29,700 Shillings (28 per cent) came from the state budget, roughly the same was due
from the Federation of Industry, and another 30,000 Shillings from the Chambers of
Commerce, of which the Viennese Chamber paid the lion’s share (21,000 Shillings).44
The Chamber of Agriculture, which had been expected to contribute 30,000
Shillings, was not willing to pay more than 5000, and it did not raise its share in later
years either, although the initiative’s propaganda paid a lot of attention to food.45 Even
less (2000 Shillings) was paid by the Chamber of Labour. Efforts by the Viennese
Chamber of Commerce to persuade its partner organizations into increased funding of
the propaganda activities seem to have been to little avail. It proved even difficult to get
money from the sister organizations in the provinces.
The first major undertaking of the working group was the organization of an
Austrian Week, which was prepared by a wide range of promotional activities a leaflet
for teachers, posters in the streets, at townhouses, post offices, schools, etc.; and an
advertising film which was shown at about 170 cinemas throughout the country.
During Austrian Week around 2300 firms participated in competitions of patriotically decorated shop windows; the winners were awarded money, badges and diploma.46
Furthermore, military bands played public concerts, leaflets ‘Your Shilling can work
wonders’ were distributed, and representatives of the workgroup talked on the radio
about the necessity to buy Austrian.
A practical problem for the patriotic consumer was to recognize Austrian goods as
opposed to foreign merchandise. Consumers were urged to ask retailers about the origins of products and the workgroup published lists of Austrian goods. Nevertheless the
lack of a label constituted a serious threat to the effectiveness of the ‘Buy Austrian’ propaganda. In 1930 an amendment to the law on trademarks enabled associations to register a brand,47 so eventually the working group created her own logo, a stylized eagle,
configured by the letters of the word ‘Austria’. The new label came to be widely used by
Austrian firms.48 Apart from making the Austrian provenance visible to customers, the
question of identifying domestic merchandise also required criteria of deciding on the
Austrian nature of a business. Already in 1927 the working group took over the definition of the association that organized the Swiss Week: as Swiss counted all goods which
had been produced in Switzerland or which had gained a substantial distribution on the
Swiss market.49 Yet, this obviously left much leeway for interpretation.
The working group ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ had been initiated by the Ministry of
Trade and business organizations, but they tried to draw in labour and consumer
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organizations. This was in line with a corporatist way of handling social and economic
conflicts. Corporatism had a longstanding tradition in Austria, which led among
other things to the creation of a system of Chambers and after the Second World War
to the establishment of a corporatist policy network called ‘Sozialpartnerschaft’. Yet,
during the First Austrian Republic corporatist cooperation was severely hampered by
the absence of a basic political consensus.50 Although the Chamber of Labour, an institution with a strong Social Democratic leaning, joined the working group, already at
the first meetings in early 1927 the Chamber of Labour demonstrated an obviously
smaller commitment to the ‘Buy Austrian’ project. The prospects for an initiative that
emphasized patriotic consumption as a common duty of all citizens, regardless of their
ideological affiliation, diminished when on 15 July 1927 a demonstration of Social
Democrats, who had been enraged by the acquittal of the defendants in the Schattendorf
trial, rightly seen as a justice scandal, led to the burning-down of the Palace of Justice.
At the end of the day about ninety people had been killed in the confrontation with
the police.51
The Austrian Week, which took place from 3 to 11 November 1927, was not covered by the Arbeiterzeitung, the organ of the Social Democratic Party. It probably was
not the right moment for a Social Democratic newspaper to support an endeavour that
had been conceived and promoted by its political opponent and its business allies. The
party convention in Linz had just come to an end and, not surprisingly, the Arbeiterzeitung
still dedicated a lot of space to this event, then switching over to a planned display of
the Social Democrats’ hold on the masses, which was organized for the National Day
on 12 November. The only eye-catching references to the buy-national propaganda
were a few adverts: two by department stores, one by the automobile industry, another
one by Semperit, a producer of car tyres. The advertisings surely cannot be interpreted
as Social Democratic enthusiasm for patriotic consumption but constituted an effort
by business enterprises to reach out to workers as citizen-consumers. In the case of cars
the average reader of the Arbeiterzeitung hardly counted among the actual consumers
of this product, but the advertising fitted well with a gradual opening-up of product
communication to the masses, even if they could not yet buy the offered goods.52
At a session of the Viennese Chamber of Commerce after the Austrian Week the
participants were informed that the event had received a favourable reception, except
from papers close to Social Democracy.53 As a reaction it was suggested to remove the
propaganda bureau from the ‘House of Industry’, the Federation of Industry’s headquarters, to the building of the Chamber of Commerce in order to improve the image
of the ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ initiative among workers.54 Yet, moving the bureau would
hardly have helped in a political context of ever more conflict, and at any rate the idea
was never carried out. Still, one should not overlook the fact that there was a certain
extent of cooperation across party lines in the activities of the ‘Buy Austrian’ working
group. The Chamber of Labour contributed to a series of radio talks which promoted
the first Austrian Week,55 and it did the same on the occasion of the second Austrian
Week in March 1929, when Edmund Palla, the Chamber’s secretary general, explained
that buying Austrian goods was a patriotic duty of Austrians.56
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As the ‘Buy Austrian’ propaganda should incite people to prefer Austrian goods,
consumers somehow had to be included into the corporatist setting. Immediately after
the war the Social Democratic Party, which counted many consumer cooperatives
among its affiliated organizations, had developed plans for a chamber of consumers,
but this project was not pursued any further by the conservative governments which
took office in 1920.57 Therefore the consumer cooperatives, increasingly powerful
players in wholesale and retail trade, could rightfully consider themselves the foremost consumer organization. While the wholesale organization of the cooperatives
contributed a small amount of money to the ‘Buy Austrian’ initiative,58 it was above
all women organizations that the executive of the working group wanted to summon
to the undertaking. At every level of discourse a standard phrase was used to explain
the relevance of women’s participation: ‘80 per cent of all goods are bought by women’.
The Chamber of Commerce first invited women organizations to discuss the topic
on 8 July 1927, when the propaganda project was presented to the public at a press
conference. Subsequently ‘housewives organizations’ formed part of the working
group;59 in 1930 a housewives’ advisory committee was constituted.60
The eagerness of male organizers to have female participants in their newly
founded working group can be seen as an empowerment of women in accordance with
the rising significance of the connection between citizenship and consumption.61
Admittedly, it remains an open question how much influence the participating
women organizations could exert on decision-making. At any rate, when turning to
ordinary women the propaganda was entirely built on traditional gender constructions. Women were cast as actual or – in the case of underage – future housewives;
advertisements tried to appeal to their ‘innate mother instinct’.62 It can be said that
women were not addressed as citizens with consumer rights but as purchasers to be
patronized.63 When economic nationalism turns to the issue of consumers’ patriotic
duties, women are always ascribed a crucial, albeit ambivalent role.64 While the patriotism of producers is often taken for granted (as for retailers and above all wholesalers,
their patriotic fervour may also be questioned), consumer choices, especially those
made by women, are seen as a potential threat to the national well-being.65
Common sense held that women were easily influenced by advertising,66 an assumption that could lead to an argument such as the following one which was brought forward in an article about ‘the teaching of economic self-esteem’:67 women succumb to
the magic of advertising without resistance, and once won over they unconditionally
surrender to the overtures made by foreign producers who dispose of more money to be
spent on advertising. When the author of this article called the consuming public a
‘capricious deity’ (eine launische Gottheit), we can assume that he was really thinking
of a dangerous goddess.
Although in principle a call to buy Austrian turned to anyone who was about to
make a shopping decision, obviously the working group elaborated explicit and
implicit criteria about whom the propaganda should target most. As a consumer you
might always have a choice, but those who are better off than just working class will have
more choices, especially if we are talking about interwar Austria whose transformation
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into a society of fully fledged mass consumption was hindered by severe economic setbacks.
Inevitably a call to buy Austrian was very much concerned with reaching the middle
and upper (middle) classes.68 Combining criteria of gender and class, then adding the
cleavage between the cities and the countryside, the figure that emerged as the main
target was the urban middle-class housewife.
Apart from women it was children and teenagers whom the proponents of the working group wanted to imbue with a greater sense of economic patriotism. Of course children themselves were not given a voice in the working group. Teachers should perform
the task of conveying pupils the importance of Austrian minded consumption; hence the
working group closely co-operated with the Ministry of Education. Children were hardly
addressed as consumers in their own right, they were taken into account as ‘the consumers
of tomorrow’ or as an influence on their parents.69 In the choice of women and children
as main audience and in its treatment of those two target groups the Austrian initiative
resembled very much the strategy of the Swiss Week, which in this respect again proves
to be a close (but older and better established) relative of Buy Austrian.70
Stereotypical Answers to a Crucial Question:Why are
Foreign Goods so Popular?
Following the advice by Hanns Kropff and Bruno W. Randolph, renowned advertising
experts,71 and in view to the planned Austrian Week, the working group organized an
essay competition.72 The participants should answer the question: ‘Why are foreign goods
so often preferred to Austrian products, and why should we buy more Austrian goods
than hitherto?’.73 The goal as explained by Leo Klemensiewicz, chief clerk of the working group, was to locate the ‘bacillus’ causing the illness Austria’s economy suffered from.
Judging from the winning submissions, the working group got more or less the answers
it had expected. One can also have it the other way round: the prizes were granted to
works in line with the presuppositions of the jury.74 Two of the first three ranks emphasized the cosmopolitan attitude of Austrians as a historic legacy of the Habsburg
Empire.75 While reaching back into history, this kind of explanation worked well with
assumptions about essential character traits of peoples: ‘Therefore, the old, typically
German vice to hold what is foreign in higher esteem than what is one’s own has deeper
roots among Austrians than among other German tribes.’76 Another supposed attribute
of the homo austriacus, defined as a subtype of the homo germanicus, was his easygoing
nature: ‘The Austrian is happy-go-lucky. He enjoys the day and seizes the hour and he
avoids worries as far as possible’.77
Among Austrians the principal target of critique was the Viennese. The stereotype of
the people of Vienna as leading carefree existences given to eating and drinking, was well
established by the early 19th century and could easily be turned into a reproach for the
sake of ‘Buy Austrian’. Cosmopolitan Vienna had always been mistrusted by conservative
provincial elites and the far right despised it for its – as they called it – ‘racial impurity’
adding to all the alleged vices of urban life.
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A typical example of this outlook is given by the articles on economic patriotism
in the Deutschösterreichische Tages-Zeitung, the organ of the NSDAP (Hitler-movement).78
Its author, the economist Otto Erwin von Scala, was living in the provincial capital of
Graz, a German-nationalist stronghold with strong anti-Viennese feelings. Approving
of the recently formed working group ‘Buy Austrian goods’, von Scala expressed his
surprise at the fact that the propaganda had originated in Vienna, where ‘carelessness,
spoiling, and enthusiasm for everything foreign’ were reigning supreme and where the
Jews, as von Scala asserted, had made themselves particularly comfortable.79 He underpinned his observation with scorning remarks relevant to the Buy-national-issue in
question: ‘Vienna, jolly Vienna of course cannot do without the fine Hungarian flour
[Nussermehl]’.80
Can Goods from Germany be Austrian?
The National-Socialist interpretation of the propaganda for ‘Buy Austrian goods’ drew
heavily on resentment against foreigners and their products, but was connected with
a seemingly rational economic discourse. As the Nazi party championed the most radical version of a German-nationalist creed, for Otto von Scala it was a pressing necessity to answer the question if the call for an Austrian-minded consumption could be
seen as orientated against Germany and German goods. He dismissed this concern by
echoing the official version that the campaign did not direct itself against any foreign
state, and certainly not against Germany. Nevertheless this was pure rhetoric, and if
the Deutschösterreichische Tages-Zeitung went further by prompting its readers to ‘buy
Austrian – buy German goods’81 (the headline of an article) it refused to see the obvious: The call to ‘Buy Austrian’, which referred to goods manufactured or grown on
Austrian territory, could hardly be made compatible with a pan-German solidarity
demonstrated by an equal treatment of products of German provenance, all the more
so as Austrian industry had good reasons to fear competition from its bigger neighbour. As state and nation did not correspond from the German nationalist standpoint,
inevitably its approach at Austrian protectionism was full of contradictions. Otto von
Scala had to go to some length to explain why one should support a claim to buy
Austrian and deplore a lack of state consciousness if the Austrian state, the viability
(‘Lebensfähigkeit’) of which Von Scala – as many others – denied,82 was nothing more
than a temporary solution. Von Scala brought forward three arguments: (1) The initiative to foster sales on the interior market would help Austria to survive until the
unification with Germany. (2) It would prevent Austria, when finally married to its
stronger neighbour, from being a liability for Germany. (3) Strengthening the Austrian
economy would facilitate its eventual integration into the German economy.83
It would be a mistake to think that these questions were of interest only to an
extremist group on the margins of the political scene, as the National Socialists then were.
On the contrary, von Scala´s reasoning was all but far off. Throughout the 1920s the Greater
German People’s Party (Großdeutsche Volkspartei),84 an avowedly German-nationalist
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party, was the junior partner in the governing coalition with the Christian Socialists and
from 1923 to 1929 it was holding the Ministry of Trade. Friedrich Tilgner, president of
the Viennese Chamber of Commerce from 1925 to 1930, relentlessly promoted unification with Germany. In 1938 he was awarded a low, ‘illegal’ number of membership of the
NSDAP because of his staunch commitment to the ‘Anschluss’.85
When considered from abroad, reconciling the call to buy Austrian with German
nationalism along the line of von Scala must have looked far fetched. Reacting to the incipient ‘Buy Austrian’ propaganda Dr Karl Janovsky, a German-speaking economist from
Teplitz-Schönau (Teplice-Šanov) in Bohemia suggested that if Austrians were determined
to focus on Austrian goods, then consumers in Czechoslovakia might stop buying Austrian
chocolate, knitted materials, and hats among other things.86 Bohemia had been the industrial powerhouse of the Monarchy and after the war the Austrian Republic continued to be
an important market. Industrialists who considered themselves as ethnic Germans had
belonged to the elite among what had been the ‘first nation’ of the Austrian part of the
Habsburg Empire. In Czechoslovakia they found themselves relegated to a minority
status and felt threatened by Czech nationalist aspirations.87 As Janovsky was the economic
policy expert of the German Central Association of Industry in Czechoslovakia,88 we can
safely assume that the critique he voiced in several articles reflected a highly unfavourable
reception that the first Austrian Week in 1927 had met among German-speaking businesscircles of this neighbouring state.
Stressing the Defensive Orientation of the Initiative
The call for Austrian-minded consumption fused economic analysis with discourses on
the duties of citizens (to be precise: on citizens as consumers), and on Austrians as
a people. On the one hand, trade balance figures and the assessment of importexport-relations, on the other hand, assumptions about the behaviour of Austrian
consumers, which were often presented as being determined by character traits of the
Austrians as a German tribe. The homo austriacus was deemed to lack self-esteem, and
therefore he was prone to buy foreign goods.89 The diagnosis requested a cure of
national pride and justified action on behalf of Austrian goods.
The same set of arguments was used for other buy-national campaigns, not surprisingly, for example, for a German counterpart of the ‘Buy Austrian Goods’-working
group. In a leaflet, dating from around 1930, the Political Economy Education Service
(Volkswirtschaftlicher Aufklärungsdienst) stated:
In Germany there exists a bias for the foreign; this becomes obvious by goods
which are of foreign provenance or are advertised as foreign often being
preferred to domestic products even if in quality or price they are not inferior or
actually superior to foreign goods or to those which sale under a foreign flag.90
In 1906 Count Ludwig Batthányi, a leading representative of the Hungarian Tulip
movement, well remembered by Austrian industrialists as an aggressive move against
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their interests, had answered to critique by Austrian-German business circles: ‘While
abroad everything that comes from the outside has to struggle with national distrust,
among us – quite the contrary – everything which is of Hungarian origin is met with
inexplicable distrust.’91
A key argument is the assertion that co-nationals tend to buy foreign goods even
if they are more expensive or of worse quality. It was not all imports that had to be
targeted, but an excess of foreign influence. A buy-national campaign typically contended that it did not take away anything from others but was just claiming what was
rightfully one’s own, a domain endangered by the invasion of foreign goods. It was to
keep this ‘flood’ at bay that the citizens, especially women and children, had to be
‘informed’ about. But already before the working group ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ came
into being, an article in ‘Die Industrie’ had suggested: ‘Where the fondness of foreign
merchandise cannot be broken by good advice, if need be tariffs should help to educate consumers’.92 Yet, this had to remain a protectionist dream while Austria was still
sticking to her free trade policy.93
A poster that was produced in 1927 on the occasion of the Austrian Week shows
a section of the terrestrial globe. The picture is separated by a white line against a red
background. In its foreground the contours of Austria, which are set against the
outlines of the European continent, catch the viewer’s eye. While Europe wears a very
dark colour, Austria shows a beaming white and thereby seems to float somewhat
above its continental background. Her borders are marked by a thick red line, disconnecting luminous Austria from her dark continental surrounding. It is important to
note that red and white are the colours of the national flag, which is also shown erected
in the centre of the schematic representation of Austria. Composition and colours fit
well with the positioning of the picture in the upper two thirds of the poster: the
viewer is confronted with a patriotic ideal, whereas in the lower part of the poster the
call to ‘Buy Austrian Goods!’ specifies what is requested from the Austrian citizen.94
The poster does not formulate an aggressive message, but it speaks the language of
protectionist isolation against neighbouring states.
In the essay competition mentioned earlier, the texts which were awarded the first
prizes had a moderate, albeit conservative tone (with authoritarian undertones), but a
poem in a notably sharper key was given one of four 500 Shilling prizes. Its title Abraham
a Sancta Clara paid homage to a famous 17th-century Catholic preacher who buoyed the
spirits of the people of Vienna in times of plague and war – and chastised them for their
penchant for good living.95 The poem was full of resentment against everything foreign
but especially against the other successor states,96 and the Allied countries.97 It ushered
in the call to delete an ugly, foreign word from the lexicon: ‘import’.
When drafting official communication in writing, the working group avoided
messages that could be interpreted by foreign observers as instigating Austrians to
boycott imported merchandise, but members of the group were less cautious when
speaking on the radio. Dr Klemensiewicz explained on Radio Vienna in October
1927: ‘The Austrian Week intends to teach egoism to Austrians’. Certainly,
Klemensiewicz did not propagate boundless chauvinism and he admitted that many
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imports were necessary, especially those of raw materials, which did not exist in
Austria. But he also stated: ‘Every good that you buy, from A to Z, from the automobile
to the toothbrush [vom Automobil bis zum Zahnbürster], should be produced in
Austrian workshops, should be products of Austrian industriousness and taste’. The
metaphor of the alphabet is one of self-sufficiency that is at least close to the idea of
autarchy. Klemensiewicz concluded with the request: ‘Show that you are patriotic egoists’.98
But in 1927 the initiative was only beginning. Some years later, with economic
depression and a sharp rise of restrictive trade policies everywhere, in Austria too an
open request to boycott foreign goods was not taboo anymore. In early 1934, when
the transformation of the Austrian Republic into an authoritarian, semi-Fascist regime
was well under way, M.J. Pasztor, a functionary of the Fatherland’s Front (Vaterländische
Front), the would-be Fascist mass organization formed by the government, complained
in an article that the ‘Buy Austrian’ campaign so far had been using only images and
texts ‘as noble and discreet as the homo austriacus [der österreichische Mensch] himself’.99 Now ‘in the era of a newly awakened Austrian patriotism’ slogans in a sharper
key were recommended. The only existing propaganda item that Pasztor judged as
aggressive enough was a poem that told people to overcome economic depression by
forsaking everything foreign (‘Lass Fremdes in Ruh’). But Pasztor preferred more positive wording moulded after the model ‘Be British and buy British’. This slogan in his
opinion was a battle cry and a resounding call for national pride. An Austrian version
soon came to be used in a brochure, with a circulation of 30,000, which was distributed among teachers at the beginning of classes in September 1934.100
Patriotic Consumption as a Means to Fight Unemployment
Nationalism always heightens the common of the nation as a whole and downplays the significance of conflicts, which split up the imagined community. The teacher brochure from
1934 says apodictically: ‘Therefore, to every Austrian applies the principle: ‘Be Austrian,
buy Austrian goods!’’.101 The two sentences are highlighted against the surrounding text,
thus the message is meant to be taken very seriously: belonging to the Austrian collective
comes first; the necessity to act accordingly second. But only compliance with the maxim
confirms the status of the consumer as a good Austrian. It is a request and an implicit
threat. Just some lines above readers have been told how to conceive the state: ‘It is like on
a boat’. The next sentence elucidates the message of the age-old metaphor of the state as a
ship: ‘Getting out really is impossible’ (‘Ein Aussteigen ist tatsächlich unmöglich’). What
will happen to someone who leaves a ship in open water? He will probably drown. This
conclusion is not made explicit but it is what the picture is pointing out to.
Who was presented as the beneficiaries of patriotic consumption? Above all
labour. Unemployment acquired enormous proportions in the depression of the
1930s, but was high even in the best years of the interwar period. Buy-national propaganda asked: ‘Is it inevitable that unemployment grows?’ and underlined that the
purchase of Austrian goods will ‘create work and bread, ban poverty and misery’
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(‘Schafft Arbeit und Brot, bannt Armut und Not! Kauft österreichische Waren!’)102 A
street poster from 1929 showed what was supposed to be a private letter by an
employee: ‘Dear Poldi! I am so happy that my job has not been axed. If people buy
more Austrian goods, no jobs will ever be axed again’.103 ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ typically used slogans that were cast in a pessimistic mood and exploited the fears of
Austrians regarding their economic prospects.104 Many propaganda items tried to motivate parents by reminding them of their children’s future: ‘Parents! If your home-country shall be able to give your children bread and work – Buy Austrian goods!’.
Foregrounding the problem of unemployment is typical of buy-national campaigns,
thus neither a speciality of Austria nor of the 1930s. In the 1980s American consumers
were exhorted to ‘Buy American – The Job you save may be your own’; and neighbouring Canada told citizens to shop Canadian, ‘because every time you buy something made here, you help a fellow Canadian keep a job’. Often such requests are
connected with racist and xenophobic undertones.105
The Austrian propaganda certainly was – as we have seen before – not free of such connotations, but the generalized sense of vulnerability as a small country which should not
annoy more powerful nations discouraged an intensive use of open xenophobia. The official
‘Buy Austrian’-propaganda also did not have an anti-Semitic bias, at least not for the period
until 1934 that is well documented. Yet, already in the 1920s merchants, craftspeople, and
professionals that were deemed to be Jewish, whatever their own opinion on this matter,
could not be sure that they represented Austrian production and trade in the eyes of an ever
larger part of society; and the state definitely ceased to be neutral ground when the democratic republic was turned into an authoritarian regime. The proclamation of a new constitution in May 1934 completed the transformation: Austria now was officially a Christian
state.106 The true faith of course was meant to be Catholicism. Whoever was not a Catholic,
or worse not even Christian, could not aspire to see him/herself as embodying the ‘Austrian
idea’ or the ‘Austrian mission’.107 Anti-Semitic prejudice had always been part of crafts
protectionism, but buy-Christian propaganda increased significantly since 1936. Boycott
initiatives directed against businesses that were considered as Jewish enjoyed the backing of
parts of the ruling elite or even originated among prominent figures of the regime.108 The
Zionist journal ‘Der Jude’ rightly observed that economic anti-Semitism, of which BuyChristian campaigns were a highly visible form, ran contrary to civil rights still granted by
the constitution.109 But the situation reflected the contradiction enshrined in the constitution of 1934 between liberal remnants and the avowed wish of transforming Austria into
an authoritarian Catholic state. It became more and more palpable that this state would not
have a place for Jews. In 1938, the ground for Nazi rule was well prepared.
Administrative Action: Stepping Up a Boycott
The ‘Buy Austrian Goods’-initiative acted in two different spheres: on the one hand
there was propaganda which the working group set up and directed to the common
public; as well as, though to a lesser degree, to traders and producers. On the other
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hand the government, where it disposed of the means to decide this matter by decree,
took more immediate action to ensure the preference of Austrian goods. Already in 1909
the government of Cisleithania, the Austrian part of the Habsburg Monarchy, had
issued a provision that the state administration should purchase goods and services
only from companies seated in the provinces of Cisleithania, unless their offers were
disproportionately more expensive. Contractors were obliged to provide just commodities that had been produced from domestic materials and to furnish proof thereof if
demanded.110 In 1919, the decree was adapted to the shrunken territory of the Republic
of German Austria,111 and seems to have fallen into oblivion in the time of hyperinflation. Yet in 1926 the Ministry of Trade reminded all bodies of the state administration that this provision was of utmost importance, and from then on it intensified
dedication to its enforcement.112 The provision of 1909 had established a rule only for
governmental consumption, but it laid the ground for efforts to reach out into the
domain of private consumption as well.
In 1930 the Chambers of Commerce published an index of school supplies of
Austrian provenance. Thirty-five thousand copies were distributed to teachers and
school authorities. This specialized guidebook should enable them to obey to a decree
issued by the Ministry of Education, which regulated not only purchases by the school
itself but also exhorted teachers to work towards the exclusive use of Austrian school
supplies in their class rooms. If the decree was taken seriously at an authoritarian institution, as schools of the early 20th century were, this meant a boycott on foreign school
supplies. No wonder the ‘Buy Austrian Goods’-working group prided itself with the
success of this move and claimed that there was an increase in the use of Austrian school
supplies. At least some teachers really seem to have controlled their pupils’ economic
patriotism. For example the Czech embassy complained that it had learned about high
school teachers who threatened their pupils with punishment if they used school
supplies of Czechoslovakian provenance. Confronted with this allegation, the Ministry
of Education played the incriminated action down as ‘spirited’ (temperamentvoll) and
refused to admonish the teachers in order not to contradict the issued decree.113
The classification of goods as Austrian or foreign was stricken with problems. The
guidebook was supposed to provide orientation, but this bible of Austrian school supplies had some defects. The firm Günther Wagner, producing in Hanover and Vienna,
complained that because the index mentioned only the ink produced by a competitor,
his business interests had already suffered damage.114 And the Czech embassy was
annoyed because the decree by the Ministry of Education mentioned the pencils of L &.
C. Hardtmuth, a firm with seat in Budweis (české Budě jovice), as an example of foreign products to be avoided. This was no lapse: The Ministry wanted to inform consumers that the well known brand Koh-i-noor was not a domestic product as it had
been before the break-up of the Empire. These types of ‘mistakes’, rooted in consumer
habits from before the war, were one of the many problems of correctly identifying
‘Austrian’ which the ‘Buy Austrian’-initiative had to tackle.
On behalf of German pencil producers, the German embassy complained about
their exclusion from the Austrian market. The embassy argued that the decree by the
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Ministry of Education was not compatible with the trade agreements between the two
states. This was a plausible objection, even if the Ministry of Trade insisted: ‘The
schools decree does not constitute a repressive measure against foreign states.’115
Was ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ a Commercial Success?
When trying to assess the results of the ‘Buy Austrian’ propaganda of the interwar
years, we should keep in mind that economists so far have not been able to provide
conclusive evidence for the effectiveness of buy-national campaigns. It seems to be all
but certain that such campaigns can significantly change consumer behaviour.116
As for the Austrian case, after the first Austrian Week in 1927 a survey was made
among retailers. On a basis of 160 returned questionnaires the findings were the
following: two-thirds of the firms said that they had observed an increase of customer
frequency during the week. One-third of the shops had also noted a rise in sales of
Austrian goods on an average of 10 per cent.117 In his report Klemensiewicz correctly
warned not to interpret the data as a sweeping success, but they seemed encouraging
to him.
Not everyone shared his opinion. Right from the beginning of the ‘Buy Austrian’
campaign there was expressed critique as to the effectiveness of the propaganda. Some
voices thought that turning to consumers in general was to no avail, others held that
targeting children was of no use because they did not qualify as purchasers in their own
right (‘Selbstkäufer’). The starting point of the working group had been the negative
trade balance. Yet the report for the period from December 1927 to October 1928
could not but admit that the trade balance had not changed. As the working group did
not want this to be interpreted as a sign that its campaign was a vain effort, it argued
that propaganda takes a long time to produce even a small effect.118 The same set of
arguments was used by the Empire Marketing Board in the face of rising criticism.119
It was not until 1937 that Austria achieved for the first time a tiny positive balance
of payment,120 but we cannot regard this as an argument that the call to ‘Buy Austrian’
was eventually working. In 1931, the Austrian government had taken up a restrictive
foreign trade policy. As a result of depression and the sharp overall reduction of foreign
trade volume the deficit had already decreased, and private consumption never recovered throughout the 1930s and thus remained well below 1929, the best year of the interwar period.121 So there we have an obvious explanation for the changes in trade balance.
We might consider the relatively small budget as an important limitation to the
effectiveness of the working group. In 1934, when the establishment of a conservative
dictatorship was seen as auspicious for any kind of patriotic propaganda,
Klemensiewicz admitted that the funds put at the workgroup’s disposal were smaller
than the budget of a medium-sized industrial company. Therefore, it had not been
possible to commission a market survey that would have allowed assessing the effects
of the propaganda. Klemensiewicz used a drastic metaphor: he described ‘Buy
Austrian Goods’ as an express train that was run on the heat of a stearin candle.122,123
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This may seem a just assessment, if we compare the available budget data to figures
from the Empire Marketing Board. In the financial year 1926–7 the British venture
disposed of £500,000,124 this is 1,724,000 Shillings,125 whereas the working group
spent 104,850 Shillings on its propaganda effort in 1927. In 1928 and 1930 the
working group commanded about roughly the same amount of money and it does not
seem likely that its financial situation improved during depression years.126 So the
‘Buy Austrian Goods’ initiative looks like a poor relation of the Empire Marketing
Board. But this impression changes if we take a per capita approach: in 1927 the
Empire Marketing Board spent 23 Shillings per UK inhabitant, while the figure was
65 Shillings per inhabitant for the Austrian working group.
If ‘Buy Austrian’ was not a huge success, it would be mistaken to attribute this
mainly to underfunding. A severer problem of any buy-national campaign, not just
the Austrian one, is the wide scope of the propaganda. It urges consumers to apply a
patriotic criterion to every single purchase he or she is about to make. When in the
1950s citizens were again requested to ‘think Austrian whenever you shop’, a popular
comedian put the dilemma of patriotic consumption in the mocking question: ‘What
is it you want? Should I sing the national anthem at the grocery’s?’.127 Moreover, in
the 1920s it could often be rather difficult for consumers to tell whether a certain
good was Austrian or foreign made. The ‘Austria’-label, which was readily accepted
by producers, made this task a lot easier. Another grave obstacle could not be removed
that easily: many or even most citizens lacked sentimental attachment to the Austrian
state, which undoubtedly is a problem for ‘sentimental protectionism’.128
Still, Klemensiewicz claimed some success for the activities of the working group:
according to him it had been possible to achieve the exclusive use of Austrian school
supplies in Austrian schools. This helps us to give a partial answer to the question: to
whose benefit? The pertinent decree issued by the Ministry of Education in 1931
explained that it had observed a decrease in the use of Austrian school supplies, namely
pencils, and it wished to be informed as to which Austrian school supplies, e.g. pencils
by Brevillier & Urban, were used in classes. It is no small detail that the president of
the Federation of Industry happened to be Ludwig Urban, also director general and
president of Brevillier & Urban, a company that suffered from low productivity and
overcapacities. In the depression years the firm pinned its hopes on a policy of
retrenchment to the home market.129 No wonder Austrian merchants were exasperated about this abuse of the call for patriotic consumption.130
The Empire Marketing Board was abolished in 1933 after Britain had embraced
a policy of high tariffs.131 In the 1920s ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ was seen by many as a
substitute, if a weak one, of high tariffs.132 But the working group did not cease to
exist when Austria turned to formal protectionism. Still, it is difficult to say whether
the propaganda continued on the same level as before. Documentation of the working
group during the years from 1934 to 1938 is scarce. This might be due to a significant decrease in activities, but records might as well have been lost. At any rate, the
working group went on with asking print media to run ‘Buy Austrian’ slogans and
since 1934 it published the Volkswirtschaftlicher Aufklärungsdienst, a journal with two,
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sometimes three issues per month aimed at leaders of cultural and political corporations.
This task was carried out on behalf of the Department of Economic Propaganda (Amt
für Wirtschaftspropaganda), which in 1933 had been established within the Ministry
of Trade.133
After the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany the working group shared the
fate of all other organizations that by the sheer fact of representing a private association in pursuit of a public goal were perceived as a threat to Nazi dominance. On
2 September the ‘Stillhaltekommissar’,134 the authority created to deal with the ‘transformation and integration’ of private associations, ordered its dissolution. Obviously
the call for Austrian-minded consumption now did not make sense any more.135
Conclusion
Was ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ a boycott campaign? No, it was not if one sticks to what
the organizers of the working group said. Yet, the propaganda certainly included the
perspective of a boycott of foreign goods. Citizens were prompted to buy national
goods on a larger scale than before. Officially they were not asked to buy exclusively
Austrian goods. But in some contexts, especially when turning to children who were
to be inculcated a patriotic attitude in matters of consumption, it turned out that if
the initiative succeeded there would not be much space left for foreign competitors.
And however one looks at the argument, the call to prefer Austrian products always
implied to refrain from buying those of foreign provenance. Furthermore, ‘Buy Austrian
Goods’ took the shape of an outright boycott of imported goods there where it left the
sphere of propaganda and used its ties to the government to apply administrative
measures against the consumption of imported goods. This was the case with the decree
on school supplies.
Was the purpose of ‘Buy Austrian Goods’ a political or an economic one? If a
political boycott/buycott is an attempt to use marketplace means to attain a goal that
is beyond the realm of the marketplace, then the campaign was above all about economics. A positive influence on the trade balance was the avowed goal of the initiative, a goal it failed to achieve. But the working group also constantly talked about
the necessity of increasing the citizens’ state consciousness and patriotism; and to
imbue Austrians with pride for their country constituted a political goal. It was not
attained either, but inspiring patriotic fervour was a particularly complex task in the
Austria of the 1920s and 1930s. The collapse of the Habsburg Monarchy had left the
citizens of the new Republic with many difficult questions regarding state and nationhood, and political conflict was already on the brink of open violence when the working group started its activities.
‘Buy Austrian Goods’ was no grassroots movement, it was an undertaking initiated by the Ministry of Trade and executed by corporate bodies such as the Chamber
of Commerce and the Federation of Industry. It tried to include the relevant social actors
and partially succeeded in that effort because of Austria’s corporatist traditions. But it
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did not seem to have inspired much enthusiasm among the institutions of the
Social-Democrats. And a strong case can be made that the main actors of the working
group pursued above all the goals of business enterprises, although the propaganda
put an emphasis on its relevance to the fight against unemployment. The working
group tried to mobilize women, but in spite of the participation of women’s organizations, its propaganda was cast in an entirely paternalistic style.
The request to ‘Buy Austrian goods’ was considered a substitute of a protectionist
foreign trade policy when the government thought it unwise to use high tariffs and
quota. Maybe it is no surprise that the slogan ‘Buy Austrian’ appeared again after the
Second World War when foreign trade was gradually liberalized and the call for patriotic
consumption gained attractiveness as a device of securing the interior market for
national producers. In 1958, the Chamber of Commerce began to organize an Austrian
Week every year, always around the National Day in October. Circumstances now
were a lot more favourable for a buy-national campaign. As the Austrian society did
not wish to claim heritage of the Nazi past, citizens were no longer told to see Austria
as a part of the German nation but as a state and a nation of her own right;136 and the
‘economic miracle’ made it easier to identify with the small Republican state.
Abbreviations
AdR
Archiv der Republik (Archive of the Republic)
BMHV Bundesministerium für Handel und Verkehr (Federal Ministry of Trade and
Transport)
BMU
Bundesministerium für Unterricht (Federal Ministry of Education)
ÖStA
Österreichisches Staatsarchiv (Austrian State Archive)
WKW Wirtschaftskammer Wien (Chamber of Commerce Vienna)
WStLA Wiener Stadt- und Landesarchiv (Municipal and Provincial Archives of Vienna)
Acknowledgements
This article relies on sources from the Viennese Chamber of Commerce and the
Austrian state archives, on the booklets for teachers published in 1934, text books of
the 1930s containing references to the imperative of patriotic consumption, and a certain number of newspaper articles that deal with the initiative ‘Buy Austrian goods’.
Though this is a sizeable body of sources it is by far not all the material that could
possibly be gathered. The investigation that the article draws on can be regarded as
preparing the ground for a more comprehensive future research project; an undertaking placed within the frame of the scholarly interest in the relation between national
identities and consumption that the author has been developing for some time now.
Currently the author is doing research on ‘branded goods and the construction of the
Austrian nation (1950–95)’. Apart from an article by the author (Kühschelm 2006),
185
the publications by Andrea Morawetz have recently shed some light on the call for
patriotic consumption in Austria (see Gries and Morawetz 2006; Morawetz 2007).
Notes
1. Die Industrie, 2 September 1927. 1–2, Kölnische Zeitung, 25 August 1927. Ludwig Urban, the president of the association said the same in a speech he probably gave on the radio. WKW, E 27468/2,
fascicle 1927: Ludwig Urban, ‘Die Bedeutung des Inlandsmarktes [The significance of the interior
market],’ n.d. [1927].
2. The official name was: Kammer für Handel, Gewerbe und Industrie (Chamber of Trade, Craft and
Industry).
3. ‘Die Bewegung, die wir entfachen wollen, soll nicht nach Art der Tulpen-Bewegung eine chauvinistische sein. Wir wollen nicht die ausländische Ware vom österreichischen Markt vollständig
ausschließen.’ WKW, E 27468/2, fascicle 1927, persons A–Z: Speech of chamber president Tilgner
at a press conference.
4. Arbeitsgemeinschaft wirtschaftlicher Körperschaften ‘Kauft österreichische Waren’, Kauft österreichische Waren: Wirtschaftlicher Leitfaden für Lehrpersonen [Buy Austrian goods: Economic guide book for
teachers] (1934, 4).
5. Monroe Friedman (1999, 11, 201–12). In general, Friedman’s definitions of boycott are an important reference for the approach taken in this article.
6. The slogan became popular in the late 1880s. It had been coined by the historian František Palacký
who had adapted a Hungarian nationalist concept (Albrecht 2001, 47–67; Boyer 2002, 54) .
7. Ágnes Pogány (2006, 46–50). In extenso, but with a strong Anti-Hungarian bias: Wolf (1979).
8. In any of the many German-nationalist local and regional newspapers one can find examples of such
propaganda.
9. Albert Lichtblaur (2006, 469), Hillel J. Kieval (1988), Teresa Andlauer (2001, 245–8).
10. Christian Klösch (2008). A shorter version of the text, which does not contain the references to economic nationalism, has been published in: Stefan Eminger and Ernst Langthaler (2008, 565–600).
11. Stefan Eminger (2005, 181–4), Peter Melichar (2006, 23, 26, 117).
12. Kauft österreichische Waren: Wirtschaftlicher Leitfaden für Lehrpersonen [Buy Austrian goods: Economic
guide book for teachers] (1934, 4).
13 Hanns Haas (1995, 472–87), Ernst Bruckmüller (1996, 294–310).
14 Fritz Weber (1995).
15. Eduard März (1981, 283, 352, 543), Roman Sandgruber (1995, 87–90, 366, 387–90).
16. Weber (1995, 27).
17. The German speaking bourgeoisie considered the Empire as their possession and dominance over
Slavic people as their natural right. Bruckmüller (1996, 294–6).
18. Eduard Kubu° (2004).
19. Peter Berger (1982, 183–205), Jens-Wilhelm Wessels (2007, 22–6, 142–55).
20. März (1981, 283–7).
21. Dieter Stiefel (1988, 323).
22. Berger (1982).
23. Stiefel (1988, 323).
24. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle Federal Ministry of Trade and Transport: Letter to Chamber Vienna,
30 June 1926.
25. WKW, E 26.468/2, fascicle companies A-Z, Vereinigte Papierwarenfabriken AG.
26. WKW, E 27.468/1, fascicle associations, Verband österreichischer Exporteure [Association of
Austrian exporters].
186
27. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle chambers, Chamber Salzburg: Chamber Salzburg to Chamber
Vienna, 21 December 1926; Chamber Carinthia: Chamber Klagenfurt to Chamber Vienna, 23
December 1926.
28. The decision was taken in the plenary meeting on 31.3.1927; WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1926:
chamber records 6851/1926 and 6851/1927.
29. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1926: Anonymous speech, n.d. [1927]. Without doubt the speech,
held in front of business men, can be attributed to one of the proponents of the working group.
30. Frank Trentmann (2008, 228–40).
31. Stephen Constantine (1998, 198), Robert C. Self (1994).
32. Thomas Oberer (1990, 1991).
33. Weinczierl was head of the Department of Commercial and Industrial Policy.
34. ÖStA, AdR, BMHV, Industrial Department, fascicle 65551/1927, 73763-10/1927: Minutes of the
meeting of 14 February 1927.
35. ÖStA, AdR, BMHV, Industrial Department, fascicle 65.551/1927, 75.472-10/1927: Minutes of
the meeting of 24 February 1927.
36. See for example: WKW, E 27.468/1, fascicle Chambers, Chamber Salzburg: Chamber Salzburg to
Chamber Vienna, 7 July 1927.
37. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1927: Chamber Vienna to all sister chambers, 12 July 1927.
38. Born 1885 Vienna, died 1959 Vienna. After the war he figures as an industrial adviser in the
Vienna directory.
39. Born Eduard Klemensiewicz 1892 Graz, died 1937 Vienna. Since 1920 he was registered with residence in Vienna, since 1924 under the name of Leo. He does not seem to have used Leopold, the
long form of the name.
40. ÖStA, AdR, BMHV, Industrial Department, fascicle 65.551/1927, 129.652–10/1927: Bericht
über die Propaganda-Aktion in der Zeit bis November 1927 [Report about the propaganda activities in the period until November 1927].
41. Eminger (2005, 56).
42. Peter Berger (1995, 403), Gerald Sturmayr (1995, 346).
43. Emmerich Tálos (1995, 381).
44. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1927: financial account.
45. WKW, E 27.468/3, fascicle year reports: financial account 1928; budget estimate 1930.
46. ÖStA, AdR, BMHV, Industrial Department, fascicle 65.551/1927, 129.652-10/1927: Bericht
47. Federal Law Gazette, no. 109/1930, Federal law concerning the protection of collective trade marks
(Verbandsmarken), 4 April 1930.
48. See Andrea Morawetz (2007, 8).
49. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1927, 9176: Organization of an Austrian Week; statutes of the working group, approved 11 June 1931, 3.
50. Tálos (1995, 385).
51. A disabled veteran of World War I and a seven years old child had been shot when SocialDemocratic and conservative paramilitary groups clashed at the small village of Schattendorf. See
Norbert Leser and Paul Sailer-Wlasits (2002).
52. Rainer Gries (2006, 62–8).
53. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1928: Manuscript without title (speech in the Chamber Vienna in late
1927 or early 1928).
54. Ibid., WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1928, 9012/1928: Draft of a letter to the Presidial Conference
of the Chambers of Agriculture.
55. ‘Inlandspropaganda-Radiovorträge [Radio speeches about the propaganda related to the interior
market],’ in Die Industrie, 30 September 1927, 7.
187
56. This at least is how he was quoted in Neues Wiener Tagblatt, March 2, 1929, 6. The Neues Wiener
Tagblatt, founded in 1867, was – along with the Neue Freie Presse – the most important newspaper of the liberal bourgeoisie. It extensively covered the activities of the ‘Buy Austrian Goods’
working group.
57. Fritz Baltzarek (1976, 221–3), Andrea Ellmeier (1990, 178–83).
58. GöC, Großeinkaufsgesellschaft Österreichischer Consumvereine, founded in 1905.
59. ÖStA, AdR, BMHV, Industrial Department, 65551/1927, 129.652: Bericht über die PropagandaAktion in der Zeit bis November 1927 [Report about the propaganda activities in the period until
November 1927].
60. WKW, E 27.468/3, annual reports: Annual report of the Working Group of Economic Bodies …
for year 1930, 3.
61. On the relationship of gender, citizenship and consumption see: Victoria DeGrazia and Ellen
Furlough (1996, 275–86), Sheryl Kroen (2003).
62. See the explication of a poster subject given by the account on the working group’s activities in
1930: WKW, E 27.468/3, annual reports: Annual report of the Working Group of Economic Bodies …
for year 1930, 19. The headline of the poster ‘Mother and child’ read: ‘Every good mother cares for
the future of her children and buys Austrian goods.’
63. On the opposition between the citizen consumer ideal and the concept of the purchaser consumer
see: Lizabeth Cohen (2004).
64. Two monographic works on cases from different centuries and continents: Lisa Tiersten (2002),
Laura C. Nelson (2000).
65. On alleged differences of the patriotism of male producers and female consumers in the case of
China see: Karl Gerth (2003, 285–354).
66. Franz X. Eder (2003, 210). Charles McGovern (2006, 37), Alexander Schug (2009, 362).
67. Otto Böhm (1929).
68. The same point can be made for Britain: Trentmann (2008, 236).
69. ÖStA, AdR, BMU, fascicle 4171, 25.015-I/3/1934: Working Group to Minister of Education, 14
July 1934; Kauft österreichische Waren: Wirtschaftlicher Leitfaden für Lehrpersonen [Buy Austrian goods:
Economic guide book for teachers] (1934, 3). Before the 1950s the opportunities for autonomous consumption of children were rather small. See: Andreas Weigl (2004).
70. Oberer (1991, 83–92).
71. For the biography of Kropff, an advertising theorist and practician in Austria and Germany, see
Bernd Semrad (2005): 58–62. Kropff and Randolph were about to finish an important book on
market analysis, the first comprehensive account of this technique available to German-speaking
advertisers: Hanns Kropff and Bruno W. Randolph (1928). See Reinhardt (1993, 47).
72. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1927: File note about the meeting with Messrs. Kropff and Randolph,
22 July 1927 (The date given is certainly wrong. Probably the meeting took place on 22 June 1927).
73. ÖStA, AdR, BMHV, Industrial Department, 65551/1927, 129.652: Bericht über die PropagandaAktion in der Zeit bis November 1927 [Report about the propaganda activities in the period until
November 1927], 1.
74. See the statement by Friedrich Tilgner at his press conference on 8 July 1927: WKW 27.468/1,
fascicle Persons A-Z: Friedrich Tilgner. Tilgner did not take part in the jury, but the vice president
of the Chamber did. Another member of the jury was Engelbert Dollfuß, the future ChristianSocialist chancellor turned dictator, then Secretary of the Chamber of Agriculture of Lower Austria.
75. The third submission was a poem that exhorted Austrians to buy Austrian goods.
76. ‘Die alte, allgemein deutsche Untugend, das Fremde höher zu schätzen als das Eigene, ist deshalb
beim Österreicher tiefer eingewurzelt als in den anderen deutschen Stämmen’.
77. ‘Der Österreicher ist leichtlebig. Er genießt den Tag und die Stunde, wie sie kommen, und geht
den Sorgen möglichst aus dem Wege’.
78. Hitler pressurized on the Austrian NSDAP to accept his leadership. In 1926 this led to a split-up
into two Nazi parties, the ‘Schulz’-party and the ‘Hitler-movement’.
188
79. ‘Und schließlich trägt das in Wien sich besonders breitgemachte Judentum auch das Seinige bei’.
80. Otto Erwin von Scala ‘Wirtschaftspatriotismus und Wiener Messe [Economic Patriotism and the
Vienna Fair]’, in Deutschösterreichische Tages-Zeitung, 11 October 1927, 9.
81. ‘Kauft österreichische – kauft deutsche Waren [Buy Austrian, buy German goods]’, in
Deutschösterreichische Tages-Zeitung, 8 November 1927, 9.
82. März (1981, 275–9), Marion Aichinger (1990).
83. Otto Erwin von Scala ‘Wirtschaftspatriotismus und Anschluss [Economic patriotism and unification with Germany]’, in Deutschösterreichische Tages-Zeitung, 11 October 1927, 9. See also Morawetz
(2007, 13).
84. An old fashioned type of a party, which apart from German nationalist craftsmen and retailers
attracted above all civil servants and teachers. Eventually it lost out to more youthful and energetic
Nazism. Ernst Hanisch (1994, 145–9).
85. Eminger (2005, 136, 234).
86. WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1928: Letter to Janovsky, 1 February 1928; E 27.468/1, fascicle associations: Verband der Österreichischen Hutindustriellen [Association of Austrian Hat Industrialists].
87. Christoph Boyer (2006, 211).
88. (1895–1972). Later Janovsky also acted as an economic adviser for the extremist Sudeten German
Party and under the Nazi regime he was chief executive of the Federation of Wholesale and Foreign
Trade in Berlin. After the war he spent ten years in Czechoslovak prison. ‘Janovsky, Karl’ (1984).
89. One of many examples that could be quoted: Leo Klemensiewicz (n.d. [1930], 3). ‘Unfortunately
the Austrian lacks self-esteem. Therefore the Austrian does not hold what is produced in Austria
in as high regard as the goods coming from abroad.’ (‘Der Österreicher hat leider zu wenig
Selbstbewusstsein. So kommt es, daß der Österreicher alles, was in Österreich selbst erzeugt wird,
nicht so hoch einschätzt, wie die Ware, die aus dem Ausland kommt.’)
90. WKW, E 27.468/1. This text is also printed in Sigurd Paulsen (n.d. [1931], 85). Paulsen gives an
overview of buy-national propaganda in many countries of the world.
91. Neue Freie Presse, May 18, 1906, 4, Wolf(1979, 274–7).
92. Alfred Bielka ‘Die Krise der österreichischen Handelsbilanz [The crisis of the Austrian trade balance]’, in Die Industrie 7 January 1927, 4, see also Alfred Bielka, ‘Made in Austria’, in Die Industrie,
18 February 1927, 5.
93. See the staunch commitment to free trade displayed in an article by Trade Minister Hans
Schürff (1927).
94. The image analysis follows the methodological prescriptions of: Gunther Kress and Theo Leeuwen
(2006).
95. Bruckmüller (1996, 119).
96. ‘On the shores of the Danube the Magyars once bickered with you, they fought for every single
Crown. Is it not enough that you now have to buy their wheat to fill your stomach, do you also need
– for heaven’s sake – biscuit and wine from Hungary? Isn’t Gumpoldskirchner just as delicious?’(‘An
der Donau und die Magyaren // lagen sich einst mit Euch in den Haaren, // taten um jede Krone oft
geizen. // Ist's nicht genug, dass Ihr jetzt ihren Weizen // kaufen euch müsst, um den Magen zu
füllen, // brauchet Ihr - um des Himmels Willen - // auch noch aus Ungarn Keks und Wein? // Ist
Gumpoldskirchner nicht ebenso fein?’). The Crown was the Austro-Hungarian currency. The sentence refers to the always difficult negotiations between the Cisleithanian (Austrian) and the
Hungarian half of the monarchy about the respective contributions to the common expenses of the
double-state. Gumpoldskirchner is a well known wine from a village south to Vienna.
97. ‘The Yankees do not let you across the sea, but they send you their shaving sticks.’ (‘Die Jankees
lassen Euch nicht übers Meer, // doch schicken sie Euch ihre‚ Shaving sticks’ her.’)
98. WKW, E 27.468/1, fascicle Persons A-Z, Leo Klemensiewicz: Speech, 13 October 1927.
99. Österreichs Wirtschaft: Wochenschrift des Niederösterreichischen Gewerbevereins [Austria’s Economy: Weekly
magazine of the Crafts Association of Lower Austria], no. 3, January 19, 1934, 41 p.; ÖStA, AdR,
BMHV, Industrial Department, fascicle 93.156/1934, 95577/1934.
189
100. ÖStA, AdR, BMU, fascicle 4171, 25015-I/3/1934; Kauft österreichische Waren: Wirtschaftlicher
Leitfaden für Lehrpersonen [Buy Austrian goods: Economic guide book for teachers] (1934).
101. ‘Für jeden Österreicher gilt also der Grundsatz: Sei Österreicher, kaufe österreichische Waren!’, Ibid., 67.
102. WKW, E 27.468/3, undated leaflet. [late 1920s]
103. WKW, E 27.468/3, fascicle 1929: Bericht über die zweite Österreichische Woche vom 1.-7. März
1929 [Report about the second “Austrian Week” from 1-7 March 1929].
104. Paulsen, a German observer, saw this as a stark contrast to the more optimistic propaganda of the
British ‘Empire Marketing Board’. Sigurd Paulsen (n. d. [1931], 33).
105. For example in the USA in the 1930s when alerting against Asian products and immigrants. Dana
Frank (2000, 187).
106. The constitution began with declaring: ‘In the name of God the Almighty, from whom all law
emanates, the Austrian people receives for its Christian, German Federal State based on the Estates
[auf ständischer Basis] this constitution.’
107. See Anton Staudinger (2005).
108. Eminger (2005, 181).
109. Der Jude [The Jew], September 15, 1936, 2; October 8, 1937, 3; December 31, 1937, 1; January
14, 1938, 1.
110. Reichgesetzblatt für die im Reichsrate vertretenen Königreiche und Länder [Imperial Law Gazette
for the kingdoms and countries represented in the Reichsrat], no. 61/1909, Verordnung des
Gesamtministeriums vom 3. April 1909 betreffend die Vergebung staatlicher Lieferungen und
Arbeiten [Decree … regarding the awarding of supply and work contracts by the state], §§ 32, 33.
111. Staatsgesetzblatt für den Staat Deutschösterreich [Law gazette for the state Deutschösterreich], no.
347/1919.
112. WKW, E 27.468/1, fascicle Federal Ministry of Trade and Transport.
113. ÖStA, AdR, BMU, fascicle 4171, 2029-I/3/1931.
116. Graham D. Fenwick and Cameron I. Wright (2000).
117. ÖStA, AdR, BMHV, Industrial Department, fascicle 65.551/1927, 129.652-10/1927: Bericht
118. WKW, E 27.468/3, fascicle annual reports.
119. Constantine (1998, 221); David Meredith (1987, 34).
120. Weber (1995), Anton Kausel, Nandor Nemeth, and Hans Seidel (1965), Gerhard Senft (2005, 191).
121. Senft (2005, 193).
122. Stearin is a form of wax used to make candles. Naming this substance does not add any relevant
information but is a rhetoric device to direct the attention of the recipients to the picture of the
faint light of a candle in order to underline the disproportionateness between the goals of the working group and its financial means.
123. Leo Klemensiewicz (1934, 42–4). The article answered to the critique by J. M. Pasztor, which was
mentioned earlier.
124. Stephen Constantine (1984, 270).
125. The calculation is based on: Jürgen Schneider, Oskar Schwarzer, and Markus Denzel (1997, 282).
126. WKW, E 27.468/3, financial accounts 1928 and 1930. There is no further budget data.
127. Günter Tolar (1988, 26).
128. I take up the expression from a contemporary German dissertation in economics: Benno Hupka
(1932, 133).
129. Wessels (2007, 43–5, 167, 318), Franz Mathis (1987, 68–71).
130. Der Handel. Organ des Gremiums der Wiener Kaufmannschaft [Trade. Organ of the representative body of
the merchants of Vienna], no. 336, 21 March 1931, 2. ÖStA, AdR, BMU, fascicle 4171, 31898I/3/1930.
190
131. Trentmann (2008, 228–40), Constantine (1998, 221), Stephen Constantine (1986).
132. See for example: WKW, E 27.468/2, fascicle 1928: Letter to Emil Janovsky, 1 February 1928.
133. Interestingly in April 1933 the workgroup’s German complement, also called ‘Volkswirtschaftlicher
Aufklärungsdienst’, which had been promoting national goods since 1930, was integrated into
Goebbel’s Ministry of Propaganda. Josef Hülser (1934, 50).
134. Verena Pawlowsky, Edith Leisch-Prost and Christian Klösch (2004).
135. WStLA, M.Abt. 119, A32, 8655/28, Arbeitsgemeinschaft wirtschaftlicher Körperschaften
[Working Group of Economic Bodies].
136. Oliver Rathkolb (2005), 35–9.
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Oliver Kühschelm [oliver.kuehschelm@univie.ac.at]. is currently a Research Fellow at the
Department of Economic and Social History, University of Vienna. His dissertation was about entrepreneurs/companies/products as Austrian sites of memory (2002, published 2005). He has subsequently undertaken research about Austrian émigrés in Uruguay (2002-03), provenance research at
the Vienna Museum of Technology (2005-07) and is currently doing research about "Brands and the
Discursive Construction of the Austrian Nation" funded by the FWF, the Austrian Science Fund.
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Implicit boycott: The call for patriotic consumption in interwar Austria

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