Coming to Terms with the Worker: West German Industry,Labour Relations and the Idea of America,1949–60

Abstract

This article situates industrialists in an ongoing discussion about the ‘Americanization’ of West Germany by focusing on business leaders' interest in public relations and human relations during the l950s. It portrays industrialists' adoption of putatively ‘American’ techniques of publicity and factory relations as an attempt to make peace with workers, while simultaneously overcoming a legitimacy crisis born of their complicity in nazi crimes. Despite their interest in American PR, many industrialists could not hide their fears of American popular culture. Industrialists therefore crafted an image of America as economically modern but intellectually bankrupt. They juxtaposed this ambivalent view of America with indigenous discourses about ‘the factory community’ and company paternalism that had been present during the Weimar Republic and the Third Reich. Ultimately, against the backdrop of the Cold War, industrialists were able to adapt to liberal democracy and ‘protect’ their workers from communism by amalgamating American and German models of labour relations.