Polizei#
Police, administrative institution for the prevention of and protection against danger or infringements of law and order under the threat of force or by coercive action. According to their fields of responsibility, the Austrian Police force is divided into "Sicherheitspolizei" (security police) and "Verwaltungspolizei" (administrative police). The security police are responsible for protection against and suppression of any danger to life, health, public peace, law and order within the state of Austria. The administrative police are responsible for the protection of specific matters of administrative law and for ensuring compliance with specific legal regulations pertaining to specific areas of administrative authority. Violations of these regulations result in the imposition of administrative fines by the police authority having jurisdiction over the activity or subject matter in question, such as building, industry and trade, traffic, foodstuffs, aliens, passports, associations and assemblies, fire-arms and explosives; other units comprise the lost and found office and the supervision of entertainments and of closing hours.
The general security police force falls under the responsibility of
the Federal Government as far as legislation and execution is
concerned. On the one hand it deals with administrative aspects of
criminal justice, which are defined in the Code of Criminal Procedure.
Suspects may be interrogated, witnesses questioned and (provided legal
conditions are satisfied) arrests, searches and seizures may be
conducted (judiciary police, criminal investigation department). On
the other hand the general security police are responsible for the
security of the state ( State Police) and for the maintenance of
public peace and law and order.
The general security police has a special organisational structure. At
the top of the hierarchy is the Central Public Security Board
(Generaldirektion fuer die oeffentliche Sicherheit), a division of the
Ministry of the Interior; it comprises the state police, the central
command unit of the gendarmerie (rural police force) and the Criminal
Investigation-INTERPOL group (co-ordination of criminal investigation
activities in Austria, central bureau of INTERPOL for Austria). Each
federal province has a Public Security Directorate, headed by a
security director, in its capital city (in Vienna the police chief is
at the same time the security director). The lowest instance is the
district administration authority (Bezirkshauptmannschaften) or
Federal Police Authorities (Federal Police Directorates in Vienna,
Schwechat, St. Poelten, Wiener Neustadt, Linz, Steyr, Wels,
Salzburg, Innsbruck, Eisenstadt, Graz, Leoben, Klagenfurt and
Villach).
The local security police within the jurisdiction of the provinces are
organised by the municipalities in their own sphere of action. Their
responsibilities are, for instance, the maintenance of public
propriety, protection against noise pollution or the issuance of
regulations governing the hours during which the doors of apartment
buildings etc. have to be kept locked.
The organisation of the administrative police is the responsibility of
the administrative authority having jurisdiction over the specific
matters in question.
The police authorities exercise their functions through Law
Enforcement Officers. Their officers wear uniform and bear arms and
act as organs and on behalf of the police authorities. In some
municipalities the local police officers are also responsible for
executive tasks on behalf of the municipal administration. The Federal
Security Police (Bundessicherheitswache) is organised in corps
assigned to a Federal Police Directorate. The corps of criminal
investigation consist of plain-clothes officers assigned to Federal
Police Directorates. The remaining security tasks are fulfilled by the
Gendarmerie. At the head of the Bundesgendarmerie (federal
gendarmerie) is the Central Command Unit of the gendarmerie, which
forms part of the Public Security Board. In the federal provinces the
provincial gendarmerie command units form part of the Public Security
Directorates. They are responsible for the district gendarmerie
headquarters and the local gendarmerie station headquarters
(Gendarmeriepostenkommando).
History: In the early Middle Ages militias were the chief law
enforcement bodies, side by side with the police forces maintained by
local rulers and the cities. Under Maria Theresia a central police
bureau with commissariats was established in Vienna in 1776. The
police was reorganised by Count J. A. Pergen under
Joseph II: The police bureau was changed into a police
directorate in 1789 to which the local chiefs of police had to report
(predecessor of a police ministry). In 1791 the independent status of
the police was again abolished, and in the following years emphasis
was laid on developing the state police (especially in the Vormaerz
period). After the revolution of 1848 the system of security was
entrusted to the municipalities. In 1849 the gendarmerie was
established, in 1850 the "basic principles of the organisation of
the local rulers' police authorities" were announced, in 1851,
after the separation of the judicial branch and the administration,
the power to sentence offenders was withdrawn from the police and
conferred upon the state courts. In 1852 the Ministry of the Interior
was transformed into the "Supreme Police Authority", which became a
police ministry in 1859 (and abolished in 1867). In 1870 police
matters were definitively conferred on the Ministry of the Interior.
The INTERPOLl was established in 1923, with the valuable co-operation
of the Chief of Police of Vienna, J. Schober and had its first
headquarters in Vienna. - Since 1993 the organisation and
responsibilities of the security and of the executive authorities have
been governed by the Security Police Act.
Literature#
K. Springer, Die oesterreichische Polizei, 1960; W. Blum, Die Sicherheitspolizei und ihre Handlungsformen, 1987; A. Hauer and R. Keplinger, Handbuch zum Sicherheitspolizeigesetz, 1993; A. Dearing, Sicherheitspolizeigesetz (SPG), 1999.