This doctoral dissertation examines British attitudes to the German ‘economic miracle’ in the years 1948 to circa 1971 principally through the eyes of politicians, officials, businessmen and informed commentators. Britain had poor productivity, balance of payments difficulties, inflation and, more than anything else, growing industrial disruption. The question is asked as to what extent Britain compared itself to Germany, the most dynamic of the European economies? Did the British think there were lessons which might have been learned particularly in the all-important area of industrial relations which went from bad to worse in Britain but in Germany were described by one British economist as ‘almost idyllic’?

Post-war economies were about the efficient mass production of goods, at which the Germans were widely considered to excel but the British much less so than before. The British cursed their debts, their problems with sterling’s international role and their global military commitments but the underlying problem judging by contemporary voices was the failure of Britain to organise itself in the workplace and achieve the level of exports it needed to compete.

This dissertation looks at contemporary British perceptions of the German economy, its industrial relations, and some of the irritations which arose in British-German economic relations for what they say about Britain.

There were in the period a surprising number of these irritations, each made worse for Britain by Germany’s growing economic strength. Britain was obliged to write-off German debts to help the German economy at a time when it felt weighed down with its own debts. Germany’s huge export success in Europe embarrassed Britain at a time when its traditional Commonwealth trade was stalling. Germany’s build-up of huge reserves produced a so-called ‘financial disequilibrium’ making worse Britain’s struggles with its inflation, balance of payments, ‘stop-go’ policies and industrial relations. The costs of Britain’s garrison in Germany was an unwelcome burden on the balance of payments for which Britain clamoured for reimbursement. When Britain, in a change of tack, decided its future lay in Europe, it was convinced that ‘Germany held the key’, only after years of negotiation to be disappointed when it found Germany provided little worthwhile help.