In Germany, works councils have a long tradition and are an integral part of the process of mitbestimmung — the right of workers to have a say in corporate decisions. Managers in Germany see the councils as a way to head off labor problems and improve productivity.

To many Americans, the notion of works councils belongs alongside socialized medicine and six-week vacations as examples of the practices that have doomed Europe to near-zero growth. But another way to look at it is that works councils are part of a model that has helped preserve Germany’s industrial base and hold the country’s unemployment to a relatively low level: 5.2 percent, compared with 7.3 percent in the United States.

“It always depends on the people,” said Franz Schabmüller, owner of FS Firmenverwaltung, a group of 10 midsize manufacturing companies based in the Bavarian city of Ingolstadt. “If the works council has people of integrity who have the interests of the company at heart, then it can work well.”

One open question in Chattanooga is whether the 1,600 or so hourly workers at the VW factory would need to belong to a union like the U.A.W. to join a works council.

The U.A.W. said it would welcome a works council, but said that it would be legal only if a majority of workers had opted for a union. And many labor experts agree.

“If the company set up a representation system like that, a union would challenge it and they could probably win their argument that it’s a company-dominated union,” said Richard Hurd, a professor of industrial and labor relations at Cornell University. Such a union set up by the company would violate American labor law, he said.