President of Austria

The president of Austria (German: Bundespräsident der Republik Österreich, lit. 'Federal President of the Republic of Austria') is the head of state of the Republic of Austria.

The office of the president was established in 1920 by the Constituent National Assembly of the first republic following the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Habsburg monarchy in 1918. As head of state, the president indirectly succeeded the emperor of Austria. The power and role of the presidency has varied drastically over time. During the early first republic, the president was an utterly powerless figurehead. After a 1929 amendment, the president's powers were greatly expanded on paper, but they were swiftly taken away again following the abrogation of the Constitution and the erection of a corporatist dictatorship in 1934. When Nazi Germany annexed Austria in 1938, the presidency was completely abolished. Following the liberation of Austria by the allied forces in 1945, the republican Constitution was restored and so was the office of the president. Though the president nominally regained the broad power vested in him under the 1929 amendments, the president voluntarily chose to serve as a ceremonial and symbolic figurehead, allowing the chancellor to remain de facto chief executive instead. Since the institution of the popular vote in 1951, only nominees of the Social Democratic Party and the People's Party were elected to the presidency, until Green-endorsed incumbent Alexander Van der Bellen won it in 2017.