The Politics of the West German Trade Unions: Strategies of Class and Interest Representation in Growth and Crisis. Andrei S. Markovits

This book is the latest in a series on Western European trade unions published by associates of the Center for European Studies at Harvard University. Like its predecessors, it is excellent in most respects. Markovits has a firm command of most aspects of his subject as a result of delving extensively into both English and German language literature and interviewing more than 120 practitioners and academics. He is not unbiased. At the outset he expresses the opinion that "without a strong, organized labor movement he Federal Republic would not only be a much less prosperous country with a far less successful economy, but-more significantly-it would not boast one of the most stable democratic polities in the world. " Although the book contains useful background chapters on union and employer organizations a well as the legal framework for industrial relations, at its core are chapters discussing in detail policy developments in the German Trade Union Federation (DGB) and four of its national unions: the metalworkers, the chemical workers, the construction workers, and the printers' union. In each union chapter there is an overview of the industry, its employers' organizations, the union organization and background, the collective bargaining structure and process, and the development of union philosophy and policy from the end of World War II to 1981. Each chapter is rich in insight. There are, for example, excellent discussions of IG Metall's search for a solution to the riddle of how at once to be maximally responsive to the immediate needs and demands of the members, to act responsibly in the overall public interest, and to remain true to its long-term pursuit of a socialist society; of the challenge by the "accommodationists" (led first by George Leber of the Construction Workers) to IG Metall's left-leaning leadership within the DGB; of the struggle by the printers to deal with technological change; and of the shift from left to right by the Chemical Workers as a result of events during the 1970s. All of the traditional major concerns addressed by German labor are extensively explored. After World War II, when the labor movement was reconstituted, it had to decide what structural form it would take and what it would adopt as its ideological stance. Its leadership decided to create a federation composed of a limited number of industrial unions; and in order to attract the widest possible support from trade unionists, the federation would not formally support any political policy. This strategy was largely successful in uniting the labor movement and in reducing to a minimum interunion jurisdictional conflict. Markovits argues, however, that the policy has restricted the political clout of the unions by preventing the DGB from wrangling "major legislative favors" in return for its support. That conclusion is likely to be controversial both inside and outside Germany. Another long-term labor issue has to do with the effects of 'juridification" (extensive legal control) of industrial relations and specifically with the system of "dual representation" under which workers are represented at the firm level not only by trade unions but also by legally independent works councils. How to effectively pursue a policy in the interests of all workers within a given jurisdictional area when it is in the interests of the councils to differentiate conditions on a company-by-company basis has been a continual focus of union concern for four decades, and no solution is yet in sight. Indeed, Markovits documents recent efforts by employers (apparently with the blessing of the government) to "enhance the power of the works councils by tempting them with firmspecific 'deals' to the detriment of the unions' collectivist agreements. " A third long-term union problem has arisen because of the legal ban in Germany on mandatory membership provisions, which has given rise to a substantial proportion of "free riders" among the workers covered by union contracts. One group of unions-the Construction Workers in particular-attempted in the 1960s to solve the problem by negotiating