Enabling Policies for Responding to 'Hate Speech' in Practice

Seminar paper from the year 2013 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Topic: Miscellaneous, grade: A- bzw. 1,7, Central European University Budapest (Department of Public Policy), course: Enabling Policies for Responding to 'Hate Speech' in Practice, language: English, abstract: In 2004, the German physical education instructor Stefan Herre founded the Islamophobic and extreme right website 'Politically Incorrect'. What started as a small blog of an individual is today the largest German-speaking website for the extreme right and Islam enemies (Spiegel Online 2011). It is ranked among the thousand biggest German websites in terms of traffic and more than 60,000 people visit daily 'Politically Incorrect'. A large part of them come from Austria and Switzerland (Frankfurter Rundschau 2011). Unfortunately, this example shows that even today, more than 60 years after fascism, Muslims often face hostility in both Germany and Austria. The so called 'Hate Speech', and the institutionalization of 'Hate Speech' by websites like 'Politically Incorrect', account for a large part of this hostility. Therefore, the state, which has the responsibility of protecting its citizens, has also the duty to develop effective ways of responding to 'Hate Speech'. This term paper deals with the question whether Germany or Austria have these effective policies for responding to 'Hate Speech'. And if yes, which one of these two countries has better legal or extralegal ways for a response.