The first employer in the Ruhr actually to provide for the chairman of his company's works council to 'sit on the Board as a member with full and equal rights' was Ernst Kuss, the head of the Duisburg Kupferhütte. He took this action, according to Müller-List, 'under the influence of Buchman' following his visit to Caux in 1949. His example inspired Dr Peter Wilhelm Haurand, who had attended Caux in 1948, to frame a crucial resolution in favour of co-determination which he brought before the Annual Congress of the Catholic Church in Germany at Bochum in September 1949.* This resolution was accepted by the Congress after some 'clarification' by Cardinal Frings, which strengthened Adenauer's hand as Catholics were so influential in his party.

(* Confirmed by Herbert J. Spiro in his authoritative treatise The Politics of German Co-determination (Harvard University Press, 1958, p. 59.)

At this time there were discussions between Adenauer and his old colleague on the Cologne City Council, Hans Böckler, about whether the trades unions would be willing to renounce public ownership in favour of Mitbestimmung- co-partnership or co-determination between labour and capital in industry. Böckler and his colleagues agreed. There was much controversy over the resulting legislation which, amongst other things, would give the workers equal representation on the supervisory boards of all large companies.31 This turned out to be 'one of the most serious tests not only for the government coalition but for the new-born Republic as a whole'.32 On the management side were many 'Ruhr Barons', dictatorial employers who had retained their positions throughout all the changes of regime. On the other side were workers' representatives who had suffered greatly under the Nazis or who had turned to Communism. Both groups were opposed to Mitbestimmung.

Men like Dütting and Dikus, in their new relationship, saw co-determination as a natural development. 'We find that on the basis of the same ideology we understand each other better and better,' said Dütting. 'As a result we are not worried about the working out of the... law... An employer who really applies the four absolute basic demands gives his workers more than any law could insist upon.'33 'We don't need to have any fear about the fight over the co-partnership law,' added Dikus.34

And so it turned out. 'When recently a new Labour Director for the Gelsenkirchen Coal-Mining Company had to be chosen under the new law of co-determination,'* Sydney Cook, one of Buchman's experienced colleagues in Germany, reported to him, 'the men's representatives, of their own accord, came to Dütting and asked him to choose the candidate jointly with them. When this was done, they presented their united proposition to August Schmidt, the national miners' President, who at once accepted it. When the new Labour Director - a worker - was himself told the news, he said to Dütting, "The first thing I want to do is to go to Caux. And secondly, I want you to help me choose the right subordinates."'35 Max Bladeck, then vice-chairman of the works councils of the Rheinpreussen mines, also asserted that long before the new law was introduced 'we had already partially introduced it at Rheinpreussen'.36

(* The Co-determination Law for the mining, iron and steel industries was passed on 21 May 1951, and similar provisions were enacted for most other industries, except family businesses with less than 500 workers, on 11 October 1952.)

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