JUNOS – Young liberal NEOS (german: Junge liberale NEOS) is the youth wing of

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n liberal NEOS party, and a full member of liberal youth organizations

International Federation of Liberal Youth The International Federation of Liberal Youth (IFLRY) is an international liberal youth organization. It consists of a global membership of national youth organizations. These are often but not exclusively affiliated with political parties that ...

and

European Liberal Youth European Liberal Youth (abbreviated as LYMEC) is an international organisation of liberal youth movements – mostly the youth wings of members of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party but also individual members. LYMEC holds ...

. Founded in 1993 under the name Liberales StudentInnenforum (, or LSF) as

Liberal Forum The Liberal Forum (german: Liberales Forum, LiF) was a centrist, liberal political party in Austria. The party was active from February 1993 to January 2014, when the party merged into NEOS – The New Austria. A member of the Liberal Intern ...

's youth organization, they broke with the mother party in 2009. Under the new name JuLis – Young Liberals Austria (german: Junge Liberale Österreich), they competed as an independent liberal party in the 2009 European elections. Ahead of the 2013 legislative election they teamed up with the new liberal NEOS party, with JuLis chairperson Nikolaus Scherak entering the Austrian parliament. In March 2014 they integrated with NEOS representing the party's youth wing.

History

Liberal Students' Forum (1993–2009)

Young Liberals (2009–2013)

At their 2009 congress, Liberal Students’ Forum disintegrated from

(LIF) and turned into an independent youth organization under the new name ''Young Liberals''. Ahead of the European elections 2009 in Austria, they, rather than LIF, received support and the required signature by Austrian MEP Karin Resetarits, who stated that the program of the Young Liberals was better. While this allowed the liberal youth party mostly consisting of members under 25 to compete in the elections with an independent list, it also deepened the rift with former mother party LIF and caused significant uproar in Austrian media. After having garnered 0.7% or 20.668 votes with almost no support and no classic advertisements, the Young Liberals Austria announced that they would concentrate their efforts on student politics for the time being. Due to formal reasons, the JuLis were not able to compete in the elections to the Austrian Students' Association (german: ÖH ) in 2009 and were subsequently not represented in the period 2009-2011. During their III. Federal Congress in October 2010, the JuLis presented the "liberal manifesto for tertiary education" and announced their candidature for the ÖH-elections 2011. Out of several dozen contestants, the JuLis were the only ones in favour of a system of deferred tuition fees, citing the inadequate studying conditions and extremely high dropout quotes in Austria’s public universities, which have a longstanding tradition of free and unrestricted education for everyone holding the

matura or its translated terms (''Mature'', ''Matur'', , , , , , ) is a Latin name for the secondary school exit exam or "maturity diploma" in various European countries, including Albania, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, C ...

. Nevertheless, the JuLis were able to secure three seats in the federal assembly of the ÖH and parts of the new program of the Austrian minister of science Karlheinz Töchterle resembled very closely to what the JuLis had proposed several months earlier. Despite the JuLis having a “complete party manifesto”, the Austrian media used to cite them as the potential youth wing of a yet-to-be-founded new liberal party in Austria. This happened in October 2012, when the JuLis participated in the foundation of NEOS – The New Austria as youth partners and Nikolaus Scherak was elected into the board of NEOS.

JUNOS (since 2013)

National board

The current national board was elected at the XXI. Federal Congress, which took place on November 2, 2019 in Vienna: * Anna Stürgkh (President) * Paul Pfahnl (Vice-President) * Julia Deutsch (Secretary General) * Bastian de Monte (International Officer) * Clemens Ableidinger (Member of Board, Policy) * Elma Jusic (Member of Board, Organizational Development) * Jan Ritter (Member of Board, Communication) * Florian Parfuss (Member of Board, Marketing) * Stef Slager (President JUNOS Students)

Political values

The JuLis see themselves as the only supporters of

liberalism Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on the rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality and equality before the law."political rationalism, hostility to autocracy, cultural distaste for c ...

amongst Austria’s youth parties. According to their manifesto, their core values are freedom and responsibility, unity and diversity, rationality and

progress Progress is the movement towards a refined, improved, or otherwise desired state. In the context of progressivism, it refers to the proposition that advancements in technology, science, and social organization have resulted, and by extension w ...

, open-mindedness and tolerance, solidarity and a federal Europe.

Structure

Since their foundation in 2009, the Young Liberals Austria are organised in federal groups that correspond to the nine federal states of Austria. As of January 2012, the JuLis have active groups in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

Lower Austria Lower Austria (german: Niederösterreich; Austro-Bavarian: ''Niedaöstareich'', ''Niedaestareich'') is one of the nine states of Austria, located in the northeastern corner of the country. Since 1986, the capital of Lower Austria has been Sankt P ...

Upper Austria Upper Austria (german: Oberösterreich ; bar, Obaöstareich) is one of the nine states or of Austria. Its capital is Linz. Upper Austria borders Germany and the Czech Republic, as well as the other Austrian states of Lower Austria, Styria, an ...

Salzburg Salzburg (, ; literally "Salt-Castle"; bar, Soizbuag, label= Austro-Bavarian) is the fourth-largest city in Austria. In 2020, it had a population of 156,872. The town is on the site of the Roman settlement of ''Iuvavum''. Salzburg was founded ...

Tyrol Tyrol (; historically the Tyrole; de-AT, Tirol ; it, Tirolo) is a historical region in the Alps - in Northern Italy and western Austria. The area was historically the core of the County of Tyrol, part of the Holy Roman Empire, Austrian Emp ...

Vorarlberg Vorarlberg ( , ; gsw, label= Vorarlbergisch, Vorarlbearg, , or ) is the westernmost state () of Austria. It has the second-smallest geographical area after Vienna and, although it also has the second-smallest population, it is the state with the ...

, Styria and Carinthia, covering all states except for

Burgenland Burgenland (; hu, Őrvidék; hr, Gradišće; Austro-Bavarian: ''Burgnland;'' Slovene: ''Gradiščanska'') is the easternmost and least populous state of Austria. It consists of two statutory cities and seven rural districts, with a total of ...

.Young Liberals Austria: About us
/ref>

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:JUNOS - Young liberal NEOS Organizations established in 1993 Youth wings of political parties in Austria Political parties established in 2009 NEOS – The New Austria and Liberal Forum 1993 establishments in Austria 2009 establishments in Austria