E3: (For)getir about Co-determination

Workers are represented in Germany by trade unions and by their elected representatives in works councils. The works council (or "Betriebsrat" in German) is a key institution under German labour law, of which mitbestimmung or co-determination at the level of the workplace, is a defining principle.

In the Delivery Charge podcast, host Aju John explores how platform delivery workers are organising for fairer conditions of work in India where he is from, and in Germany, where he lives. In the first two episodes of this podcast, we learnt about delivery workers organising in Berlin at the platform delivery companies Gorillas, Flink, and Lieferando. One notable aspect of their organising activity were the sometimes parallel campaigns to establish Betriebsrats at these companies. After a campaign that lasted several months, and despite the legal hurdles placed in their way, the Gorillas Workers Collective conducted Berlin-wide elections in November 2021, at which some among them were elected to the Betriebsrat (or Works Council). 

For some of the worker activists that we met on those episodes, Germany’s Works Constitution law or the Betriebsverfassungsgesetz, which is the law that provides for the establishment of works councils at workplaces, was an article of faith. For these workers, it promised the difficult process of organising workers, a measure of stability. Its provisions could protect some worker activists against retaliatory firings and also extend them financial resources. For them, the exercise of the space provided by the law in order to meet and make plans, was itself a form of worker resistance. But Ronnie's experience of this law as he worked at Getir, perhaps the world's largest quick commerce firm, was almost the polar opposite.

Ronnie, an engineer from Kerala in India, moved to Berlin in 2019 for better economic opportunities. He was fired from Gorillas in 2021 and from Getir in 2022. In between these firings, he experienced Getir's attempt to install a works council at the company, and had to organise his colleagues to oppose it. The story of this eye-opening attempt to quell the spirit of the Betriebsverfassungsgesetz was also one about how a recent migrant from India learnt to fight a company valued at 20 billion dollars.

 

Also in this episode, our closer look at some parts of the law that governs labour relations at these companies, leads us to an examination of the position of such bodies as the Gorillas Workers Collective, in the context of a dual system of worker representation that recognises only trade unions and works councils. We look for answers in the campaign for a Betriebsrat at Flink and the contest at Lieferando's Betriebsrat elections between the Lieferando Workers Collective and a list put forward by the trade union NGG.

Apart from Ronnie, you can also listen to Rob from the Flink Workers Collective, Mo from the Lieferando Workers Collective, Dr. Eva Kocher, a professor of law at Centre for Interdisciplinary Labour Law Studies at the European University in Frankfurt (Oder), and Dr. Oğuz Alyanak, a postdoctoral researcher with the Fairwork project.