Studentenorganisationen

Student Organisations: 1) political student organisations: All Austrian university students are represented by the Austrian National Union of Students, founded in 1845. Its all-Austrian central committee (65 members, elected every 2 years) is made up of 8 political groups (1997). Most important of these are the Aktionsgemeinschaft (AG, conservative tendency), the Verband der Sozialistischen Studentinnen und Studenten Österreichs (VSStÖ) and the Grüne & Alternative StudentInnen (GRAS). The Junge Europäische Studenteninitiative (JES, conservative), third-strongest group in 1985, has since then continuously declined. The Ring Freiheitlicher Studenten, for a long time second-strongest group and largely made up of members of national-freedomite students´ associations, has become insignificant.

Student representation at a secondary school level is mainly effected by the Union Höherer Schüler (UHS, founded in 1973) and the Aktion kritischer Schüler (AKS, originally established as an initiative of pupils in Upper Austria around 1976, organised on a federal level since approx. 1983).

2) student organisations of the churches: Katholische Hochschuljugend (KHJ). The Katholische Hochschulgemeinden (diocesan institutions) are frequented by the Katholische Hochschuljugend as well as by non-organised students and are responsible for a number of students´ halls of residence and university cafeterias. The Marianische Studentenkongregationen (MK) is organised by Jesuits; the Gemeinschaft christlichen Lebens (GCL) is a branch of the MK. Another student organisation affiliated to a church is the Evangelische Hochschuljugend.

3) associations ("corporations"): Austria has a total of 500 student associations, about 300 of which are organised at secondary school level; the 200 academic associations are oriented along various lines. An association consists of active members (students; aspirants are called "Füchse", full members are known as "Burschen") and senior members (graduates). Students can only join while they are still undergraduates. The oldest Austrian association is the Corps Saxonia Wien (since 1850). The first associations for female students were established before World War I and then again since 1977 (oldest: Puellaria Arminiae, Hollabrunn 1977); there is a total of approx. 20 female associations and only a few mixed ones. The best-known associations are: a) denominational: Cartellverband (44 associations), Kartellverband katholischer nichtfarbentragender akademischer Verbindungen (ÖKV, 15 associations), Akademischer Bund katholischer österreichischer Landsmannschaften (KÖL, 9 associations), Ring katholischer akademischer Burschenschaften in Österreich (RKAB, 3 associations), Wingolf, Schwarzburgund, Schweizer Studentenverein (Helvetia Oenipontana Innsbruck), Vereinigung christlicher farbentragender Studentinnen in Österreich (VCS, 3 associations), Mittelschüler-Kartell-Verband (165 associations), Verband farbentragender Mädchen (VfM, 9 associations). - b) national-freedomite (only some of which practice duelling): Burschenschaft (30 associations), Kösener Senioren-Convents-Verband (KSCV, 17 corps in Austria), Coburger Convent der Landsmannschaften und Turnerschaften (CC, 5 in Austria), Sängerschaften (5 associations), Akademische Turnvereine (5 associations), and 2 associations of female students (Vienna and Graz), Österreichischer Pennäler-Ring (ÖPR, approx. 80 associations).

Approx. 60 associations have their own houses, usually used as students´ hall of residence.

Literature: P. Krause (ed.), Studiosus Austriacus. Handbuch des österreichischen Korporationswesens, ³1982; G. Hartmann, Der CV in Österreich, 1994.