Broadening the definition of an Austrian.

last updated 8 January 2015

Austria

Franz Schellhorn

Austrians will have to shed their racism, and soon, said Franz Schellhorn in Vienna’s Die Presse. A “shrinking population” can’t afford to be so picky about which foreigners it accepts into its bosom. Don’t get me wrong: Austria “is one of the most generous countries in the world” in taking in refugees seeking asylum. But we don’t have a very high opinion “of foreigners in general.” An Austrian citizen with a non-German last name is almost certain to be described as “a recent arrival” or even “a third-generation immigrant”—as if some excuse must be given for the unsightly foreign moniker. It isn’t like that abroad. “In the U.S., a new citizen feels like an American the second he gets his passport.” That’s because the U.S. acts like the nation of immigrants it is. Once immigrants become American, they aren’t treated like second-class citizens. “No wonder all the qualified foreigners head to the U.S., not to Austria.” It’s time for the Austrian government to streamline the immigration process and eliminate the arbitrary barriers that keep nationals of some countries out. If we are to maintain our social safety net in the coming decades, we simply will have to welcome more workers from abroad. We must become “a nation of immigrants.”