This is a chapter from a book celebrating the centennial of the 1919 German Revolution in which worker councils played an important role. In the Introduction, the Editor did a fine job of describing the content of my chapter.
“In Chapter 11, David Ellerman offers a theoretical justification for a form of workplace democracy. He argues that a philosophical defence of workers’ control of workplaces and the products of their labour is possible outside of the lineage of Marxist and communist theory. [DE: Amen!] In place of the common theoretical tradition of the council movements, Ellerman turns to principles drawn from the abolitionist, democratic and feminist movements in order to construct a novel defence of self- managed workplaces.” [pp. 23-4]