German labor law defines good time by its purpose. When an employer plans new technical systems, new work processes or new workplaces, it must inform the works council, and the law names the Einsatz von Künstlicher Intelligenz, the use of artificial intelligence, explicitly. It must consult the works council so rechtzeitig …, dass Vorschläge und Bedenken des Betriebsrats bei der Planung berücksichtigt werden können, early enough that the works council’s proposals and concerns can still be taken into account in the planning. The same law asks employer and works council to meet at least once a month. They must negotiate disputed questions mit dem ernsten Willen zur Einigung, with the serious will to reach agreement.
Software Needs the Works Council
In a German company with a works council, new software that can record how employees work cannot simply be switched on. The works council has a right of co-determination over technical systems that are able to monitor employees’ conduct or performance. The courts look at what the technology can do, not at what the employer intends. In 2016, the Federal Labor Court ruled that a blood donation service with about 1,300 employees needed its works council’s agreement for how it set up the comment function on its Facebook page, because visitors could post comments there about identifiable staff. In 2022, the same court treated the introduction of Microsoft 365 as subject to this right. Because the software needs one rule for the whole company, it ruled that the company-wide works council is responsible. Without an agreement, a conciliation board decides.
The Plan on Display
Before a German town designates land for new housing or a business park, it must tell the public möglichst frühzeitig, as early as possible, about the aims of the plan, the alternatives that differ substantially, and the likely effects. Residents must have the chance to comment and discuss. The draft plan is then published for one month, and anyone may submit comments. The law ends the procedure with a duty: Die fristgemäß abgegebenen Stellungnahmen sind zu prüfen; das Ergebnis ist mitzuteilen. (The comments submitted on time must be examined, and the result must be communicated.)
Twelve Hours to Comment
When a federal ministry prepares a draft law, it is to send it möglichst frühzeitig, as early as possible, to the states, the associations of local governments and the national associations whose interests it affects. The rule is old. Its predecessor from 1924 already asked ministries to bring in the representatives of the professional groups concerned in good time. In October 2019, an unusual alliance of employers’ associations and unions wrote an open letter of protest. They included the industry federation BDI, the energy association BDEW, the union federation DGB and the services union ver.di. A ministry had sent a draft over a weekend and wanted comments by Monday at 6 p.m. The letter said this left weniger als 12 Stunden, less than twelve hours, to prepare a position, and that it was not the first time.
The School Conference
In North Rhine-Westphalia, every school has a Schulkonferenz, a school conference. The law calls it the school’s highest body for participation. Within the law, it decides on the school’s program, on which textbooks are introduced, on the school rules, and on whether lessons are spread over six days of the week. In lower secondary schools, teachers, parents and students hold seats in equal numbers. The principal chairs the meeting but has no vote, except to break a tie.
The Soldiers’ Representative
In the Bundeswehr, soldiers elect a Vertrauensperson, a person of trust, to represent them. Before a disciplinary superior decides on certain personnel measures, he is to hear this representative, unless the soldier concerned expressly refuses it. The law adds two sentences that turn a formality into an obligation: Das Ergebnis der Anhörung ist in die Personalentscheidung einzubeziehen. Über die Anhörung ist ein Protokoll anzufertigen, das zu den Akten zu nehmen ist. (The result of the hearing must be included in the personnel decision. Minutes must be taken of the hearing and placed on file.)
Over People’s Heads
Betroffene zu Beteiligten machen — make those affected into participants. It is a familiar rule of German change management. A podcast of the Bundeswehr’s staff college calls it a very frequently quoted sentence.
Jemanden ins Boot holen — to bring someone into the boat.
Mitspracherecht — the right to have a say.
Einen runden Tisch einberufen — to call a round table, so that all sides of a conflict sit down together.
Über die Köpfe hinweg entscheiden — to decide over people’s heads.
Jemanden vor vollendete Tatsachen stellen — to present someone with completed facts. Duden explains it as confronting someone with a situation created on one’s own authority.
Basta-Politik — politics by basta, that’s final. It is never praise.
Wutbürger — the enraged citizen. The Society for the German Language chose it as word of the year 2010, during the protests against the Stuttgart 21 rail project. It explained that the word expressed people’s outrage dass politische Entscheidungen über ihren Kopf hinweg getroffen werden, that political decisions are made over their heads.
Communication Is Disturbed
On 10 September 1989, two months before the Wall fell, thirty East Germans published the founding call of the Neues Forum, the New Forum. Its first sentence was: In unserem Land ist die Kommunikation zwischen Staat und Gesellschaft offensichtlich gestört. (In our country, communication between state and society is evidently disturbed.) It asked for a democratic dialogue in aller Öffentlichkeit, gemeinsam und im ganzen Land, in full public view, together and in the whole country. On 21 September, the state news agency called the group hostile to the constitution and the state. By the end of 1989, about 200,000 people had signed the call.
Ask, Not Demand
On 16 November 1976, the leadership of the East German ruling party stripped the singer Wolf Biermann of his citizenship while he was on a concert tour in West Germany. The next day, a group of leading writers and artists met at the home of the poet Stephan Hermlin. Among them were Christa Wolf, Heiner Müller, Stefan Heym and the sculptor Fritz Cremer. They wrote an open letter: Wir protestieren gegen die Ausbürgerung, we protest against the expulsion. They asked the state to reconsider the measure. According to a witness, the word bitten, to ask, replaced the original fordern, to demand, at Cremer’s suggestion. More than one hundred other artists joined them. Some were expelled from the party, others received party penalties, and more than one hundred artists and writers eventually left the GDR.
We Reject the False Doctrine
On 31 May 1934, the Confessing Synod of the Protestant Church met in Wuppertal-Barmen and adopted a declaration written mainly by the theologian Karl Barth. It rejected the attempt by the pro-Nazi Deutsche Christen to subordinate the church to Nazi ideology and to build a centralized Reich Church. It has six theses. Each states a teaching and then names what it rejects, beginning with the words Wir verwerfen die falsche Lehre, we reject the false doctrine. Today the Barmen Declaration is printed in the Protestant hymnal. In many Reformed and United churches, pastors commit to it at their ordination.