The Councils movement in Germany, at first, followed much the same course at much the same pace as it did in Russia. In Germany, as in Russia, the Councils, after reaching at a bound the sole power during the days of revolution, relapsed under a re-assertion of Parliamentary and Party government; then recovered, and, in the case of Russia, realised the second revolution. The German movement was last spring (1919) in the early stage of recovery. Its development is of special interest to us, in that eventually the German movement will probably take a middle place between the Russian and our own.
Before the revolution the Labour movement in Germany was very much in the same condition as with us. The attempt to combine on a patriotic platform all productive forces, and to concentrate Capital and Labour on winning the war, had only superficially smoothed over the distrust between Employers, Associations and Labour organisations, or the dissension between heads of unions and the bodies of workers. When the revolution broke out on November 9th it was carried through first by committees of sailors, then of soldiers, and finally of workmen, that sprang up simultaneously and assumed supreme authority. The advent of this new authority, however, brought about an alliance between the previous authorities thus put on one side, the Employers' Associations and the Trades Unions.
The employers, who had hitherto been resisting claims for an eight-hour day and a share in control, found themselves threatened with expropriation. Under the leadership of a Captain of Industry, Hugo Stinnes, they at once opened negotiations with the Unions led by Legien; and by November 15th reached agreement on the eight-hour day and the establishment of Labour Associations (_Arbeitsgemeinschaften_) equivalent to our Whitley Councils, and Labour Chambers (_Arbeitskammern_), for dealing with wages and welfare, in which employers and employed would have equal representation.
As Dr. Reichert, spokesman for the metal industries, has pointed out to his supporters, these concessions looked more than they were. For the eight-hour day would have to be abandoned unless, as was unlikely, it became general in Europe; and as to the associations, it should always be possible to get in and bring over a "Christian" representative of one of the Labour organisations under the influence of the Catholic Centrum. It is this agreement, none the less, between the Trust and Trade Union bosses that is the basis of the present Coalition Government's Labour policy, and that is embodied in the new Constitution.