2 EMPLOYEE REPRESENTATION 
the habit of hasty generalization, which will suffice to illustrate the 
many misconceptions regarding the movement. Inasmuch as such 
a notion may influence or determine conduct, its extension is regret- 
table; for the employer who inaugurates émployee representation as 
an antidote for unionism not only paves the way for serious opposi- 
tion but ignores his opportunity to make of employee committees a 
constructive force furthering the ends of production and public 
service. The trade union leader, on the other hand, who sees in 
employee representation only an adversary, it has more than once 
been demonstrated, misdirects his efforts in a futile and untimely 
battle. 
There is need for an evaluation of the movement which will provide 
at least tentative answers to the many pressing questions which are 
being asked on all sides. What motives have prompted inauguration 
of employee’ representation? What objectives actuate the parties 
to employee representation after it has passed through the initial 
stages of its development? Is employee representation a vital 
phase of a newer era in personnel relations, or but a passing panacea? 
What bearing, if any, has employee representation on the develop- 
ment of a more truly cotperative spirit in business? Is it likely to 
alter any of our prevalent conceptions regarding property rights? 
Is the spread of employee stock ownership making superfluous em- 
ployee representation by substitution of a proprietorship interest for 
the present employment interest? Does the growth of employee 
representation indicate a need for any special treatment of industrial 
government in public school or collegiate curricula to qualify workers 
and managers for more effective participation in the industrial organi- 
zations to which they will later belong? These and a host of other 
queries, many of them more specific, are being asked. Answers are 
needed not simply because the questions suggest themselves but 
because intelligent direction of business enterprises requires a con- 
scious philosophy of purpose and an understanding of the means 
available for attaining desired ends. Blind imitation of practices 
established by large and flourishing corporations is rarely wise; yet 
it is likely that some of the representation plans which have been 
adopted originated in the desire to emulate others. On the other 
hand, there are some industrial administrators who refuse to play 
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