Faith in Britain

movements filled the vacuum and in the Cold War climate of post-war Europe they provided a non-socialist alternative to Communism. Unlike the denominational and sectarian parties of the pre-war era, the new movements and parties were specifically detached from Church control and separate from any specific denomination. The Belgian Party declared in 1945: 'We are Christian because we want to build upon human values that represent the foundations of our Western culture and civilisation. Historically they were brought forth by Christianity; today, however, they are the common inheritance of believers and non-believers.'

Ditching the pre-war strands of Christian socialism and confessional conservatism, the new Christian Democratic movements moved from a narrow base to Christianinspired pragmatism. Their success at the polls in the period since then has marked them out as the most consistently successful movement in post-war Europe.

Adenauer9 was a principal influence during this period. He saw the need to reconcile and to unite Protestant and Catholic and his achievement in fulfilling this objective was truly remarkable. He recognised that a 'third way' was needed between unlimited domination of private capitalism or its substitution by some kind of State capitalism. The Ahlen programme put out by the new Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in the British zone therefore opposed both socialism and capitalism. The over-great concentration of economic power was to be countered by limitations on corporations, cartels and share ownership. Nationalisation was demanded for the coal and iron industry. The position of workers was to be strengthened by giving them a share in decisions and a right to information about the situation of the company. This was strongly in line with Pius XI's 1931 encyclical,Quadragesimo Anno. On social questions the works council would have the right to be heard. Planning and guiding the economy were accepted in certain circumstances but were not seen as an end in themselves; the well-being of the people was the main aim. The Christian Democratic parties became broad loose alliances or federations, composed of many different groups. They all remained close to the Catholic trades union movement while accepting the disciplines of the market.

Although the West German system of industrial relations clearly benefited from this clear-sighted vision, the major impetus to economic renewal came from the massive investment provided by the American Marshall Plan. This enabled the Federal Republic to achieve a rapid and large-scale reconstruction of its economy.

Over-reliance on American funding did, however, wed the Germany system to its sources of finance, and the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), significantly tempered their criticism of structural capitalism.

A number of the new Christian Democrat parties specifically avoided the word 'party' in their title (eg CDU) in order to highlight the all-embracing nonideological nature of their politics, compared with the narrow party-based outlook of their socialist and Communist rivals. This was a lesson learnt by the