The Linz Program of 1882 was a political platform that called for the complete Germanization of the Austrian state

German nationalism in Austria

German nationalism is a political ideology and a current in Austrian politics. It has its origins in the German National Movement of the 19th century, a nationalist movement of the German-speaking population in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and had striven for a closer connection of the...

. It was created in response to the rising social, economic and political position of the Slavic peoples within the Austria-Hungary

Austria-Hungary

Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...

 Dual Monarchy. The framers of the program were fearful that the Slavs were overrunning the German element of the monarchy.

The Framers

The Linz Program was created by five Austrian intellectuals of German descent:

• Victor Adler
  Victor Adler
  ----Victor Adler was an Austrian Social Democratic leader.Born in Prague, Adler received a university degree in Vienna in 1881. He founded the Socialist movement in Austria and created the Marxist journals Gleicheit in 1886 and Arbeiter-Zeitung in 1889...
  
  , a Jewish physician, socialist and founder of the Social Democratic Party in Austria. First associated with the liberal German nationalist movement
  German nationalism in Austria
  German nationalism is a political ideology and a current in Austrian politics. It has its origins in the German National Movement of the 19th century, a nationalist movement of the German-speaking population in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and had striven for a closer connection of the...
  
  , he later became an activist for the Austrian working class;
• Georg Schönerer, a politician who began as a liberal German nationalist
  German nationalism in Austria
  German nationalism is a political ideology and a current in Austrian politics. It has its origins in the German National Movement of the 19th century, a nationalist movement of the German-speaking population in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and had striven for a closer connection of the...
  
   only to later in life become a leading anti-Semite and supporter of an extreme Pan-German agenda
• Robert Pattai, a lawyer;
• Heinrich Friedjung
  Heinrich Friedjung
  Heinrich Friedjung was an Austrian historian and journalist.Friedjung was born in Roschtin , Moravia . The son of a Jewish family grew up in Vienna, and studied history in Prague and Berlin under Theodor Mommsen and Leopold von Ranke...
  
  , a Jewish historian;
• Engelbert Pernerstorfer, a writer and later Socialist activist.

The Manifesto

The goal of the framers was to create a German-dominated Austrian state. They proposed ceding the regions of Galicia, Bukovina

Bukovina

Bukovina is a historical region on the northern slopes of the northeastern Carpathian Mountains and the adjoining plains.-Name:The name Bukovina came into official use in 1775 with the region's annexation from the Principality of Moldavia to the possessions of the Habsburg Monarchy, which became...

 and Dalmatia

Dalmatia

Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....

 to Hungary

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

 or giving the regions complete autonomy, and they wanted Austria's ties to Hungary to be only of a personal nature, with no administrative or legislative consequences. Additionally, German was to become the official language of Austria, and a proposed Customs union

Customs union

A customs union is a type of trade bloc which is composed of a free trade area with a common external tariff. The participant countries set up common external trade policy, but in some cases they use different import quotas...

, which would be added to the monarchy's constitution, would provide strengthened ties to the German Reich.

Rather than being a bluprint for a political movement, the proposal was more rhetorical. The emotional inclinations of the framers are well-represented in the following excerpt from their manifesto:

"We protest against all attempts to convert Austria into a Slavic state. We shall continue to agitate for the maintenance of German as the official language and to oppose the extension of federalism...[W]e are steadfast supporters of the alliance with Germany and the foreign policy now being followed by the empire" (Roman, 512).

Ultimately, Adler and the others wanted Austria to exist separate from the Habsburg

Habsburg

The House of Habsburg , also found as Hapsburg, and also known as House of Austria is one of the most important royal houses of Europe and is best known for being an origin of all of the formally elected Holy Roman Emperors between 1438 and 1740, as well as rulers of the Austrian Empire and...

Monarchy, which controlled much of central Europe at the time; instead, they wanted to tie themselves as close as possible to Germany.

After 1882

Following its creation, the Linz Program never gained much support in any influential political circles. Additionally, the framers eventually distanced themselves from the program. This was due in large part to Schönerer's venomous anti-Semitic inclinations, which became associated with the program over time.