Markus Müller-Schinwald is a foreign affairs editor at the Austrian national public service broadcaster ORF. He is responsible for the weekly magazine on European affairs, Europajournal, which is broadcasted on the radio station Ö1.
The Labour Party’s surprising success in the Netherlands may merely have proven opinion polls wrong but the political earthquake experienced in Austria will clearly have lasting consequences. Both Austria and Malta happened to achieve gender equality among elected MEPs, prefacing a drive to achieve the same among appointments to top EU jobs.
The coming EP elections will serve as a stress test for the role that Croatia plays as the latest EU member state. It will also deliver a verdict on local elites’ efforts to restore their influence in Bulgaria and gauge popular sentiment regarding Austria’s upside-down political system.
