Abstract
The Publicity Department of the Austrian Fatherland Front served the St & auml;ndestaat regime (1933-38). An elaborate organization on paper, the Fatherland Front's actual work was bound up in the performance of para-fascism and the surveillance of opposing parties. Each of these modes of being mutually reinforced the need for the other and created a unique self-awareness of failure within the movement. As such, the Publicity Department offers a microcosm of the larger challenges of the St & auml;ndestaat, which faltered in the face of economic collapse, political violence, and a population largely indifferent to its attempt to secure Austrian sovereignty in the 1930s.