Introduction

World War II left Europe in economic devastation and ruins, both East and West. The immediate postwar years set the stage for the development, however, of two distinct types of corporatism in Western and Eastern Europe. In the West, the postwar settlements among labor, business, and the state embraced a new, nonfascist, democratic brand of corporatism. They established the foundations of a comprehensive social system that peaked in the 1970s, producing remarkable economic miracles on the basis of internal social cohesion and solidarity. In the East, the postwar years of transition to state socialism also encompassed significant adjustments and compromises between society and the state.