[1] EU member states differ in the degree of worker involvement in corporate management.
In Germany, most large corporations are required to allow employees to elect a certain percentage of seats on the supervisory board.
These differing traditions of worker involvement have held back the adoption of the Statute for a European Company Regulation 2001 for over a decade.
The Directive provides for worker involvement in the SE if a minimum percentage of employees from the entities coming together to form the SE enjoyed worker involvement provisions.
The Directive permits Member States to not implement these default worker involvement provisions in their national law, but then an SE cannot be created in that member state if the provisions in the Directive would apply and negotiations between workers and management are unsuccessful.