Capability agenda

Austria

Generated 2026-10-03

The frame includes 125 countries. Each dimension is scored from 0 to 100, with no overall ranking, and each score shows its confidence beside it. Read the known limits of the data before you quote a score.

Open the profile: indicators, values, years and sources

Where Austria stands

Dimension	Score	Confidence	Trend
Anticipation	74.6	0.46	+3.5 over 10 years using 2 indicators
Agency	48.5	0.54	no trend
Coordination	91.6	0.39	no trend
Trust	74.8	0.50	no trend
Learning	63.9	0.55	no trend
Experimentation	44.2	0.33	-0.2 over 10 years using 3 indicators
Adaptability	76.0	0.62	no trend
Building	53.9	0.57	-1.5 over 10 years using 3 indicators
Shared Purpose	57.7	0.42	-0.6 over 10 years using 2 indicators

Score

weakNear the floor of the frame. Check the confidence before reading anything into it.0 to 25
below middleIn the lower half of the frame.25 to 50
above middleIn the upper half of the frame.50 to 75
strongNear the top of the frame on this dimension.75 and above

Confidence

very thin0.00 to 0.25
The score rests on one or two indicators. Do not quote it on its own.
thin0.25 to 0.45
A minority of indicators, or evidence old enough to have moved. Read with care.
usable0.45 to 0.65
Enough evidence to compare countries, with known holes.
good0.65 and above
Most indicators observed, recent, from official or intergovernmental sources.

Capability over time

Select a dimension to see how Austria’s comparable evidence has moved over time. The vertical scale is the current comparison frame, from 0 to 100.

Dimension

Period

Capability position in the current frame0 to 100

Experimentation 1996 → 2026: 100.0 to 55.5 (-44.5) over 30 years using 2 indicators

Agenda items on this timeline

2020FMA Regulatory Sandbox

Historical values use today’s frame from 0 to 100 and a matched basket of indicators. They show movement in the available evidence, not an overall development score. Dated agenda items appear on a separate timeline and do not change the score. A missing line means the evidence does not support a comparable trend for that dimension.

What to raise

These are the lowest scores with usable evidence. Thin evidence appears below.

Agency

48.50.54

How able are individuals and organizations to turn an intention into action?

Uses 4 observed indicators. no trend.

Highest usable scores: New Zealand 92.3, Australia 89.2, Estonia 84.3.

Missing indicators: Adults doing digital tasks.

What to measure first

The evidence is too thin to manage these dimensions confidently.

Experimentation

0.33

How easily can new approaches be attempted, tested, abandoned, and improved?

Uses 4 observed indicators.

Missing indicators: Venture deals, Firms through regulatory sandboxes, University spinouts.

Rejected datasets: Business share of R&D.

Coordination

0.39

How effectively can independent actors organize around shared objectives?

Uses 3 observed indicators.

Missing indicators: University-industry collaboration, Public-private collaboration.

Rejected datasets: Government effectiveness, Regulatory quality, Logistics performance.

Shared Purpose

0.42

To what extent can people imagine themselves as participants in a common project?

Uses 3 observed indicators.

Missing indicators: Sense of national belonging, Volunteering, Political polarisation.

Rejected datasets: Voice and accountability.

What to keep watching

These dimensions score at least 50 with usable evidence.

Dimension	Score	Confidence
Adaptability	76.0	0.62
Trust	74.8	0.50
Anticipation	74.6	0.46
Learning	63.9	0.55
Building	53.9	0.57

Missing data

18 requested indicators have no comparable dataset, and each one lowers confidence. A gap can become an indicator when a comparable series covers at least two countries.

Dimension	Missing indicator	What it asks
Anticipation	Government foresight capacity	Existence, mandate and continuity of a national strategic foresight function.
Anticipation	Long-horizon research commitments	New competitively awarded public research grants that run for five years or longer, as a share of all new competitive public research grants awarded in the year.
Agency	Adults doing digital tasks	Share of adults who carried out a named digital task in the last three months, such as sending a message with an attached file, moving a file between devices or using a spreadsheet formula, counted one task at a time and never as a skill level.
Coordination	University-industry collaboration	Intensity of research collaboration between universities and firms.
Coordination	Public-private collaboration	Frequency and scale of joint public-private delivery of national objectives.
Trust	Trust in public institutions	Confidence in national government, courts and civil service.
Trust	Court case clearance rate	Civil and commercial cases resolved in a year as a share of cases filed in the same year.
Learning	Adult learning participation	Share of adults in formal or non-formal education and training in the last 12 months.
Experimentation	Venture deals	First venture capital rounds closed by companies based in the country in the year, per million people, counted by deal and never by amount.
Experimentation	Firms through regulatory sandboxes	Firms admitted to, and firms completing, a regulatory sandbox or controlled trial regime in the year, per million people, summed across every regulator in the country.
Experimentation	University spinouts	Companies formed to commercialise university research, per million people.
Adaptability	Disaster preparedness and recovery	Demonstrated capacity to prepare for and recover from major shocks.
Adaptability	Institutional responsiveness	Speed at which rules and public programmes are changed in response to new conditions.
Building	Large project delivery	Cost and schedule performance of major public infrastructure projects.
Building	Firm scale-up rate	Share of young firms reaching significant employment or turnover thresholds.
Shared Purpose	Sense of national belonging	Reported identification with and attachment to the national community, as distinct from pride in the nation.
Shared Purpose	Volunteering	Share of adults who volunteered time to an organisation in the last month.
Shared Purpose	Political polarisation	Degree to which political differences run along a single hostile divide.

What the indicators miss about Austria

Documented deliveries linked to missing indicators. They do not affect scores or confidence.

FMA Regulatory Sandbox (Experimentation)
Austria's Financial Market Authority admitted eight FinTechs to its Regulatory Sandbox between its launch on 1 September 2020 and January 2023, five seeking authorisation as European crowdfunding service providers and three offering crypto-asset or securities services, and one participant had obtained a licence for a digital trading platform by the start of 2022.
AMS training measures (Schulungen) for jobseekers (Learning)
Austria's Public Employment Service (AMS) had on average 76,496 people a day enrolled in its training measures in 2025, up 1.3 percent on 2024, against an annual average of 65,126 in 2015.
COMET, Competence Centers for Excellent Technologies (Coordination)
Austria's COMET programme, run by the FFG for the federal ministries and co-funded by the Länder, had approved 81 competence centres and K-projects with eligible costs of 1,669.80 million euros by 30 March 2017, in which about 450 scientific partners and about 1,000 company partners cooperated, according to the Court of Audit.
COVID-19-Kurzarbeit, 2020 to 2021 (Adaptability)
Austria's social partners drafted a COVID-19 short-time work model on 13 and 14 March 2020, the AMS adopted its directive on 18 March and the ministers approved it on 19 March, three days after the first lockdown began, and in 2020 113,771 firms with 1.25 million employees used the scheme, against 508 firms in 2009.
Koralmbahn Graz to Klagenfurt, opened seven years after its contracted completion date (Building)
Austria's federal rail infrastructure company ÖBB-Infrastruktur AG forecast the Koralmbahn's total cost at 6.139 billion euros at the end of 2023, 282.4 million euros or 5 percent above the 2012 baseline, but missed both the 2018 completion date in the 2004 Koralmbahn contract and the 2023 opening date in the 2012 to 2017 framework plan, according to the Court of Audit, and the line entered passenger service on 14 December 2025.
Bildungskarenz with Weiterbildungsgeld, and its abolition (Learning)
Austria's Public Employment Service (AMS) paid Weiterbildungsgeld from 1998 to employees taking up to a year of educational leave, an average of about 14,000 recipients in 2021 at a cost that rose from 236 million euros in 2019 to 646 million in 2024, until the Nationalrat ended the benefit on 31 March 2025 in a budget consolidation law.

Contribute

Fill a gap, file evidence or challenge an indicator at github.com/envisioning/national-capability-benchmark. The docs explain the method and decisions.

🇦🇹Austria