The Tasks of the Austrian Convention

The Austrian Convention’s aim is to work out an Austrian constitution which is structured, citizen-friendly and efficient.

The current Austrian constitution was mostly drawn up by the jurisprudent Hans Kelsen in 1920. In its version of 1929, it is still valid today. However, the Austrian constitution has been changed more than 80 times. Today, it consists of more than 1,000 constitutional provisions and is thus somewhat confusing.

Thus the Austrian Convention was inaugurated on 30 June 2003 to structure the constitution Subsequently ten working groups were formed. Until the end of 2004, the members of the Convention as divided into the ten working groups will go through the constitution, to define the relation between federal government, provincial diets and the European Union, and to work out responsibilities.