Darrel Moellendorf interviewed Hermann Dirkes on
February 27 about the steel workers' fight and the difficulties they face from all sides, including their own union leadership.
Hermann Dirkes lives and works in Duisburg, being a member of the factory council at the Thyssen Eisenbahn und Hafer inland docks, where 2,250 people are employed.
HAT distinguishes the struggle at Duisburg-
Rheinhausen from others in West Germany?
The Krupp Steelworks' struggle in Duisburg-Rheinhausen is now in its fourteenth week. That makes it the longest struggle in one factory in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). What's special about it? First, the 5,300 workers employed at Krupp-Rheinhausen have been extremely militant. They have developed very strong strike methods, unlike any others in the FRG, but similar to those in other countries. The struggle has spread widely alongside the union, but not against it. Officially, there is no strike today in Rheinhausen.
Nonetheless, there is a very sharp labour struggle.
There has been resistance to massive layoffs before in the FRG. What's new is the duration of this particular struggle, and its radicalism. The workers at the Krupp
Steelworks are not alone — they have had broad support and solidarity from the entire
Rheinhausen community of Duisburg, where 60,000 people live. They have the sympathy and solidarity of broad circles inside the unions, not just in IG Metall, but also in the public service workers' union, print workers' union, business, banking and insurance union and even the police was reported by the bourgeois press as "resembling a general strike". And that was right. Streets were blocked, important bridges over the Rhine were blocked, the autobahn was blocked, production stopped and a variety of other spectacular actions occurred.
In Rheinhausen itself, a "town committee" is active, which meets twice a week. At first there were a couple of hundred people attending; today, at least a thousand show up for each meeting
Solidarity is coming not only from the unions and the community, and not only from those steel workers who are affected but from the entire region. It's coming from the churches and the schools. The Rheinhausen grade school and high school students have gone on strike twice. Both times there were massive demonstrations of over 10,000 young people. There have also been a number of days of action, when the largest steel plants in Duisburg (which is at the centre of West German steel production) have been closed down.
There have been massive and repeated strikes: parades of 1,000-1,500 have marched to other steel plants and a nearby mine to win solidarity from other workers.
• Why has this struggle become so militant?
On November 26, by chance, the factory council discovered some news that was a bombshell for Rheinhausen. The leaders of Thyssen and Mannesmann — both big steel companies with their main production centres in Duisburg — had secretly agreed with Krupp to a "cooperation concept". Krupp was to give its production of trains and tram rails to Thyssen by mid-1988, and its smelting process to Mannesmann by the end of the same year. The entire Krupp foundry, rolling process, cokery and training centre in Rheinhausen were to be closed. Some 5,300 jobs were hanging in the balance.
You must remember that at the high point of steel production, in the early 1970s, 16,000 people were employed in this works. In Rheinhausen there's a Krupp hospital; parks, streets and lakes are named after members of the dynasty. Rheinhausen could just as well be called Krupphausen. Steel has been produced there for generations. And its 60,000 inhabitants are economically dependent on the Krupp works.
Originally, the plan was to have been made public on April 1, 1988. The discovery of the plan by the factory council on November 26 last year sparked off an immediate strike the following day in reaction to this callous manoeuvre. On the following Monday [November 30] there was an enormous public factory meeting. Normally these occur four times a year and are not open to the public. Twelve thousand people attended this meeting from all the steelworks in Duisburg, from other industries and from the regional population. The management sought to justify its policy. This brought forth a torrent of eggs and the director had to take cover.
Another important reason for the militancy of the Krupp workers is that since the high point of production in the 1970s, thousands upon thousands of jobs have been eliminated. The unemployment rate for Rheinhausen already stands at 20%. The steel companies have been claiming that
"There has been massive resistance to union.
The current stage began on November 26 last year, with a more or less spontaneous
16 sozi on Dece. Ibach, ehes tie sist poin work stoppage. It achieved its highest point
International Viewpoint #139 • April 18, 1988
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WEST GERMANY for jobs
they must rationalize production, reduce the number of employees in order to remain economically competitive with foreign companies. At the beginning of the 1980s there was clear rank and file resistance to this systematic elimination of jobs. In 1982-83 a town committee appeared for the first time to support the struggle within the factory. Then in 1986-87, many steel companies began a series of mass closures. This time entire communities were affected, like Thyssen-Hattingen, Thyssen-Oberhausen and Kloeckner-Max Huette in Bavaria.
In early 1987, the director of KruppRheinhausen tried to eliminate 2,000 jobs. He sought the cooperation of the factory council leaders and the rank and file by saying: "We must rationalize production. We have to release 2,000 wage earners, and if you don't accept this then we'll just have to close down the entire plant." There was massive resistance against this ultimatum. During this period an important change occurred: as a result of the elections held every three years in the steel industry, the majority on the factory council changed. The new majority was heterogeneous, but politically to the left.
On the present factory council there are declared communists, revolutionaries and left socialists supporting a wide spectrum of parties and political orientations. In the last few years a layer of progressive union functionaries has arisen as well. • How has the union reacted to this employer's offensive?
IG Metall called for an industry-wide strike on January 18, 1987. But it was not willing to push for a duration of the strike. The leaders of this union continually tried to reach an agreement with the bosses in the form of pension plans or compensation for the job losses through retraining programmes for younger workers and the so-called Employment Associations. These were something that IG Metall demanded during the entire year of 1987 in opposition to a plan put forward by the employers' association called the Steel Fund. The steel companies, with public financial aid, proposed to fund an endowment that would provide for retraining younger workers, while older workers were to receive their usual retirement payments early, beginning at 55. IG Metall correctly refused this plan and put forward instead the proposal for
Employment Associations.
In distinction to the Steel Fund, with this plan no worker was to lose employment. All the surplus labour power was to be transferred to the Employment Associations. There, workers would receive full wage compensation, whereas in the Steel Fund plan the ceiling was around 77% of the previous net wage. The Employment Associations were to develop alternative forms of production.
It was a nice model which, naturally, could only function if there were a harmonious capitalist society. It had a certain impact on the rank and file and the population of the area, but it never became a reality. It quickly became apparent that IG Metall was never really prepared to push for these Employment Associations. We took note of this when, in May 1987, a document on IG Metall's negotiations with the steel bosses came into our hands. The central themes of the discussions were the continuation of old ways of cooperation and a "solution" that included a new industry-wide plan for closures. In total, 35,000 workers were to be signed out of their jobs. Of these, 16,000 were to go through early
We protested. We went on television. In the union, we applied pressure, protested against the time plan and looked for solidarity. In a coordinated action of unionists from five or six of the most important steel plants resolutions were written proposing an alternative. We demanded that the IG Metall leadership struggle for "rationalization protection". We thought it was necessary to wrest a contract from the corporations for no lay-offs, no plant closures and the immediate reduction of the working week from 38 to 35 hours.
We also put forward a unified pension plan for the entire industry. Under present conditions there are quite varied pension plans for those taking early retirement. With one company it might be 100% of the wage, with another 90% and with yet another even lower. Another of our demands was a complete ban on the "loaning out" of workers. There are corporations that "loan" their workers out to others. We wanted this abolished across the whole industry.
This plan could have been realized by industry-wide strike action. But not a single factory council received even a letter from
WEST GERMANY the union leadership explaining why the proposals weren't taken up. • A demand has been put forward to socialize the steel industry. Is this a realistic goal at this point, or even a solu-
There have been many forums which have dealt with the question of the socialization of the steel industry. IG Metall is traditionally on record, in paragraph two of its statutes, as being for the socialization of the largest capitalist industries and the banks.
At the beginning of the 1980s there was an intensive debate within the steel industry that centered around updating this demand. The discussion was initiated from the base of the union. The focus, then, was Dortmund-Hoesch, plants. There were resolutions from union members in practically every steel factory demanding that IG Metall take the call for
At that time the Schmidt government, the Social Democratic Party (SPD)-Liberal coalition, was in Bonn. But that was near the end of the coalition. And the debate was broken off quickly after the Kohl government came into office on March 6, 1983. It was clear that with this reactionary government the demand to socialize the industry could not be carried through. One could demand it, but it was not a concrete political
On the other hand, the union bureaucracy was revealed as never being scrious about this demand. A majority of the IG Metall congress in 1983 voted for nationalization, and the programme containing the demand was published in 1985 as the "Steel Policy Programme". But with the change in government diminishing the prospects for a campaign to socialize the industry, a new space for manoeuvre was created for the bureaucracy. The programme was pushed further and further into the background. Yet some very important things are included in it, among them the declaration that they want to realize the socialization of the entire industry — both profitable and nonprofitable alike. Unfortunately, this programme stands only on paper. It was an important political success for the left in the union, but it exists only on paper.
In Rheinhausen, the Steel Policy Programme played a role in the discussions very quickly. The social-democratic mini17 April 18, 1988 • #139 International Viewpoint
WEST GERMANY sters who came here were confronted with its demands. They responded: "Take a look at Britain, at France, at Italy. There the steel industry is nationalized. What's come of it? Nothing. Rationalization and the elimination of jobs occurred there even more quickly than in Germany".
It's true that in Britain 60% of the steel industry was destroyed by 1980-81, that in France over 40% of the industry is lost and that now new rationalization steps are happening in the Italian steel industry, putting 25,000 jobs at risk. But, of course, what the social democrats didn't say is that these nationalized industries ist industries. They are banks, they have the the same lack of regard ests of working people. In refusing socialization of the steel industry they entangled themselves in a curious contradiction, because in one and the same breath they declared that in these countries production levels had been artificially
One problem, of course, remains unchanged. We have a reactionary national government in Bonn democratic government in Nordrhein Westfalen that is on the right wing of that spectrum. They both want no intervention in the existing system of property relations. So, it is still very difficult today to make the demand for the socialization of the industry into a concrete one. Most of the workers know this, although in principle thev are in favor of it. Most of the lett knows this too and up to now, unfortunately, we have not been able to unify around a common perspective, although this is being • Recently there was a new steel conference. What's the significance of
In this sort of situation where there is so much resistance, the politicians have to get active or at least simulate activity. And that is what's happening. On February 24 there was a conference on the steel, iron and coal industries. Taking part in this conference were business people from the biggest capitalist concerns, politicians and a handful of unionists — very moderate, right-wing
What were the results? The state government of Nordrhein Westfalen is to contribute 500 million DM to politico-economic "structural reform" in the state. There will also be contributions of 400m DM from the federal government and 100m DM from
18 ing employers to Nordrein Westfalen, I the EEC. The "reform" is to consist of lur-
International Viewpoint #139 • April 18, 1988 opening new factories and supporting new
But what does this mean for Rheinhausen? Not many Krupp employees put much hope in this conference, although Rheinhausen was a topic of the discussion. Above all, those gathered agreed that the plant could no longer be maintained. Formally, it is to remain a decision of the management whether or not the plant remains open. And Krupp has declared that there closing the plant in coordination with Thyssen and Mannesmann. It was agreed that training up in Rheinhausen The Krupp management announced formal decision on the closing of the Rheinhausen plant some time after the conterence. This could occur any time within the next few months. But if one listens to the commentary of the politicians with respect to this conference, if one reads the press attentively and between the lines, it is perfectly clear that all those who took part in the conference agreed that Rheinhausen
The Krupp workers understood this immediately. As the results of this conference became known through the media on the went on strike again. The early morning through Rheinhausen Rhine and the city hall
So the rage and the fury of the Rheinhaucreased. The question is, though, what perspective can advance the struggle and how long can this high level falls into resignation?
Yesterday morning it was made known in the media that the IG Metall negotiating commission and the employers' tion sealed an agreement which will shorten the length of the working week from 38 hours to 36.5 hours with full wage compensation, beginning on November 2, 1988 and running through to October 1990. Wages will rise 2%, first on March 1 this year and again in August 1989. Taking inflation and tax increases into account, this means a decrease in wages. This agreement so far has not been viewed as a catastrophe or even a serious set-back. Yet the employment effects of the 36.5-hour week will be absolutely minimal. Even the immediate implementation of the 35-hour week in the steel industry would save only 8,000 of the currently existing jobs, and not create a sin-
Although, for now, the possibility of widening this struggle has been knocked out of our hands, the Rheinhauseners will fight on and they will count on the solidarity of other unions — not only in the steel industry but in other industries — and the solidarity of the local population. I'm pretty
The first reaction after the February 24 conference was a display of the will to continue. They know that they do not stand alone. And they also know that KruppRheinhausen is not the only workplace threatened in the region. Just in the last few days we have read in the papers that Philips will release 1,500 employees in the neighbouring community of Grefeld. The BBC factory in Mannheim will close an operation, laying off 1,500. The mining industry is to cut 35,000 jobs between now and 1995, threatening 30,000-40,000 more in related industries. The automobile industry declared recently that the high point for employment has passed by. It's only a matter of time until new lay-offs occur. The paradox is that this produces the possibility for the Rheinhauseners to widen their network of solidarity and increase the intensity of
Still, the Rheinhauseners are involved in a very difficult struggle. Whether or not it advances will depend on many factors. The pressure grows stronger every day; it reaches them from the leaders of IG Metall, from the government. certain trend is apparent. In the beginwere largely positive. With a few exceptions, this is no longer the case. which the rank and file needs to strugbe expressed concretely in donations, in sympathy actions, in the dissemination of information, in solidarity strikes, in sending solidarity delegations and in inter-union discussions. Such solidarity knows no borders. It's important for unionists in Europe and North America in particular 1o keep themselves informed about this exemplary struggle and to pass on the information. It's not a unique struggle or a unique problem. And this could be the successful example of a struggle against the capitalist crisis. *