Adoleszente Mädchen, das sexuelle Schutzalter und die „sexuelle Liberalisierung“ in Österreich der 1960er und 1970er Jahre

Abstract

English abstract: In the course of the Austrian criminal law reform of the 1950s to 1970s, the provisions on the sexual age of consent were also renegotiated. In these debates, the stage of development of the sexual body of girls and boys seemed to be the first point of reference for determining it. The majority of legal experts and parliamentarians were of the opinion that the criminal law should protect prepubescent children from adult sexual acts. In the case of adolescent, underage girls, however, the case was much less clear. Here, the legislature clarified that male sexual desire for a girl's body is legitimate if it can be read as a female body. Austria was also one of the first European countries to introduce an age tolerance clause into its age of consent regulations. The article shows that sexual liberalization was problematic in the context of a continuing gender hierarchical order, especially for adolescent girls: Their sexual rights were inadequately secured.