Fichte's global material constitution

Abstract

The article shows that Fichte's conception of human rights implies concrete guidelines for the economic organization of states and international relations. First, I elucidate Fichte's view on human rights at the domestic level. Fichte's complex theory of human rights consists in a meta-right to live in a state that secures at least two “original rights”: a right to bodily inviolability and a right to sufficient property. I focus on the latter. Due to Fichte's unorthodox view of property rights as rights to actions rather than objects, this amounts to a right to work. This right, according to Fichte, must be realized in a planned economy. Second, I focus on the global level. Fichte's right to sufficient (unorthodox) property has implications for three dimensions of global justice: cosmopolitan right, the right of nations and commercial relations. Third, I draw some insights from thinking through Fichte's global material constitution for long observed conceptual tensions regarding his political and legal philosophy, namely between freedom and security as well as cosmopolitanism and nationalism, and for current debates in politics and political theory.

Introduction

Liberal perspectives on human rights have been criticized for their “detachment from material developments” (Goldoni and Wilkinson, 2023: 15). In the tradition of Karl Marx, the concept of the “material constitution” emphasizes, descriptively, that human and constitutional rights are but one dimension of a particular social order that is also (among other things) crucially constituted by its economic mode of organization. Normatively, the concept of the “material constitution” can be employed to emphasize the economic implications of theories of human and/or constitutional rights. In this vein, Marianne Weber has emphasized that “[t]he peculiar significance of Fichte's original rights lies in their development to concrete economic demands” (Weber, 1900: 33). ¹ Fichte can therefore be seen as a “premarxist socialist” (Weber, 1900: 2) in the tradition of the French Revolution. In this tradition, François Noël Babeuf is said to be the first to have connected human rights to economic demands, by postulating a right to work (Weber, 1900: 7; cf. Honneth, 2023: 371).

The first goal of the article is to spell out the exact conceptual relation between Fichte's complex theory of human rights and his proto-socialist political economy. ² Fichte's domestic ideal of a proto-socialist economy has direct implications for his views on global justice. Therefore, spelling out the relation between Fichte's theory of human rights and his political economy includes a discussion of his ideal of the rational organization of the state and the global realm. The reconstruction of this relation is based on Fichte's works Foundations of Natural Right According to the Principle of the Wissenschaftslehre (1796/7) [FNR] and The Closed Commercial State. A philosophical sketch offered as an appendix to the Doctrine of Right and as a test of a politics to be delivered in the future (1800) [CCS]. My interpretation of the conceptual relation between human rights and political economy in Fichte contributes to the historical study of his political, legal and economic philosophy in at least two ways. First, Fichte's specific complex and relational conception of human rights in the FNR has only recently been reconstructed (Neuhann, 2024). ³ While, as the subtitle of the CCS itself suggests, it is obvious that Fichte sees his political economy as an implication of his views in FNR, this has thus far not been framed as flowing directly from his account of human rights. Second, the article provides a succinct overview and reconstruction of Fichte's views on global justice, along the dimensions of cosmopolitan right, the right of nations and international commercial relations. In doing so, it solves an interpretative puzzle regarding a tension between Fichte's internationalist position in FNR, proposing a confederation, and his more nationalist one in CCS, recommending economic self-sufficiency.

The second goal of the paper is to make Fichte visible as a thinker of the “material constitution” (Goldoni and Wilkinson, 2023), and thus to make his thinking about the connection between human rights and egalitarian political economy accessible. ⁴ Samuel Moyn has recently argued that since the 1970s human rights have largely been disconnected from questions of economic justice. However, human rights are by themselves “not enough” to guarantee justice (Moyn, 2018). Fichte provides a useful historical resource for thinking about the connection between human rights and an egalitarian political economy. ⁵ Relatedly, Lea Ypi has recently put forward the idea of “moral socialism.” ⁶ Moral socialism expresses the normative ideal of a form of socialism that is moral (and not totalitarian) in the sense that it is founded on the idea of protecting subjective freedom of agency. In the face of global inequalities, both Moyn and Ypi address the pivotal question of how liberalism may be combined with economic egalitarianism. In this article, I recuperate Fichte as a historical resource for thinking through this question. ⁷ Recovering Fichte in this respect does not mean that he provides a satisfactory answer. Quite to the contrary, I believe it is valuable to consult Fichte in this respect because his oeuvre discloses crucial challenges and tensions at the heart of this project. Being aware of these may contribute to sharpening our philosophical and political judgement with respect to distinguishing the undesirable implications and slippery slopes of endorsing certain positions and methods (and subsequently questioning these) from real conceptual and political trade-offs.

Accordingly, the third goal of the paper is to present a tableau of the challenges and tensions involved in the project of combining liberal human rights and socialism that are revealed by Fichte's “global material constitution.” In doing so, on the one hand, I contribute to the historical study of Fichte. I show how thinking through Fichte's “global material constitution” gives a fuller picture of the tensions between cosmopolitanism and nationalism, as well as freedom and security in his oeuvre. On the other hand, in considering Fichte's views on globalization and the freedom of movement of persons, this section shows that protectionism and restrictive views on migration have long been not only unwelcome features of the ideal of socialist economics, but also unfitting ones, considering that this ideal is originally based on liberal rights. Since we are still dealing with the issue that political demands for substantial economic redistribution are repeatedly linked to anti-migration sentiments today, it is worth critically engaging with the earliest instantiation of this tension in Fichte. This might help us construct a viable ideal of “moral socialism” that acknowledges genuine conceptual and political trade-offs, while being true to its liberal foundations.

Human rights, property, and the material constitution

In the FNR, Fichte presents a complex theory of human rights and defends a human right to sufficient property. In this section, I elucidate the meaning of this right, explain its position in the FNR, and show why realizing it leads to Fichte's ideal of a “material constitution,” embracing a planned economy. Note the key position of property for the argument from human rights to the ideal of a planned economy: sufficient property is a requirement of human rights and Fichte's economic theory is based on his theory of property. In a summary paragraph in the CCS, Fichte writes: “All these assertions are founded on my theory of property” (CCS, 129; GA, I.7: 84).

The human right to sufficient property in the FNR ⁸

The FNR is Fichte's major work in political and legal philosophy, published in two parts in 1796 and 1797. The first part is subdivided into three main divisions (Hauptstücke) and two appendices. In the first main division, the “deduction of the concept of right”, Fichte argues that the concept of right is a necessary condition of self-consciousness. Roughly, Fichte aims to show that it is intrinsic to our nature as self-conscious beings to operate with the concept of right. The concept of right expresses the idea that we ought to limit our (external) freedom to a certain degree, to allow others to exercise their freedom (to a certain degree). ⁹ In the second main division (“deduction of the applicability of the concept of right”), Fichte aims to show that this concept is in principle applicable to the spatiotemporal world. In the third main division (“systematic application of the concept of right; or the doctrine of right”), Fichte then lays out what the empirical world would look like if the concept of right were realized in it. ¹⁰

The first chapter of the third main division introduces “original rights, rights [that …] are contained in the mere concept of the person as such” (FNR, 87; GA, I.3: 390). A world in which the concept of right is realized, would, according to the architectonic structure of the FNR, be one in which every person enjoys original rights. Although Fichte does not refer to them as such, they may also be called human rights. This is because deserving original rights depends on no particular features of a person and a common minimal definition of human rights is that they are rights we have qua human. ¹¹ Substantially, Fichte puts forward two original rights: a right to bodily inviolability ¹² and, as I will argue, a right to sufficient property (FNR, 108; GA, I.3: 409). The formulation of the second original right is as follows:

(2) The right to the continued existence of our free influence with the entire sensible world. (FNR, 108; GA, I.3: 409)

From here we can get to the right to sufficient property in three steps.

[Action] I interpret “continued existence of our free influence with the […] sensible world” as free action in the world. For Fichte, all actions are realized through the body and the body is a part of the sensible world and moves in it while acting (cf. §2, 5, and 6 of the deduction of the concept of right in the FNR).

[Property] Fichte holds an unorthodox view of property (rights): “The object of the property contract is a particular activity” (FNR, 184; GA, I.4: 20). This stands in contrast to the standard view that property rights concern the use of objects (Nance, 2019: 645f.). ¹³ Accordingly, having property in an object, for example a car, is in fact only a shorthand for having the right to particular actions, namely, among others, to drive or sell the car. Other actions pertaining to the car, like having it thrown into the ocean, are forbidden. “Owning an object” is therefore an imprecise way of expressing a set of someone's exclusive rights to certain actions. Also, Fichte explicitly states that the second original right constitutes the “ground of all [positive] property rights” (FNR, 106; GA, I.3: 407). So, we can also insert “property” for “continued existence of our free influence with the […] sensible world.”

[From “entire” to “sufficient”] So far, I have omitted the word “entire” from “continued existence of our free influence with the entire sensible world.” According to the previous two steps, we would then have either “the right to all actions” or “the right to all property.” Interpreters have been puzzled by Fichte's absolutist depiction of original right (e.g., Horstmann, 2001: 155; cf. FNR, 103; GA, I.3: 404). It may sound like Fichte is thereby negating the justified existence of other free beings (who may interfere with my freedom), although earlier in the FNR he asserts that free beings can, in principle, only exist in the plural (second theorem of the deduction of the concept of right). Picardi (2022) therefore identifies an ambiguity regarding Fichte's “original right,” namely that it is unclear whether it “presupposes a plurality of free beings” or is conceived “from the abstraction of an individual thought of as isolated” (126, note 16). With regard to this puzzle or ambiguity, I hold the view that “free influence with the entire sensible world” is not equivalent to full individual control of the whole world. Rather, it expresses the idea that any restriction of an individual's (principally unlimited) access to the world must be well justified. In turn, a well-justified restriction of access to the world does not violate one's “free influence.” This perspective matches the “republican account of freedom as independence” or non-domination that has been attributed to Fichte (Nance, 2019: 653). ¹⁴

While Fichte leaves room for context-specific variations regarding what are justified reasons for restricting the freedom of individuals (cf. FNR, 98f.; GA, I,3: 401), he also specifies that any division of possible actions in (the relevant part of) the world must satisfy a sufficiency threshold. This is related to Fichte's view that all human actions are ultimately based on one common goal of action: “the highest and universal end of all free activity is to be able to live” (FNR, 185; GA, I.4: 22). Accordingly, “[t]o be able to live is the absolute, inalienable property of all human beings” (FNR, 185; GA, I.4: 22). Since Fichte also calls activity that is (in a mediated sense) directed at securing one's ability to live labor, ¹⁵ this claim may be reformulated as: “everyone ought to be able to live from his labor” (FNR, 186; GA, I.4: 22). This, of course, opens a discussion concerning what one concretely needs to “live.” I believe that, for Fichte, discerning these basic needs involves an element of context-dependency (for more on this, see Neuhann (2020b: 55f.)).

These three steps have shown that the second original right may plausibly be interpreted as a human right to sufficient property. As the reformulation “everyone ought to be able to live from his labor” suggests, the fulfillment of this right essentially concerns being part of a functioning system of the division of labor. Fichte specifies such a system to imply a planned economy already in FNR (189ff.; GA, I.4: 25ff.) and extends this discussion in CCS.

Fichte's ideal of a planned economy

Why does the realization of the right to sufficient property imply a planned economy? The following argument ¹⁶ is based on what Michael Nance has called the “Guarantee”-dimension of Fichte's unorthodox account of property, another peculiar aspect of it next to the one that it focuses on actions rather than objects (Nance, 2019: 645–652). ¹⁷ It expresses that, for Fichte, the right to a certain activity should not be merely an abstract possibility but includes the “guarantee” for all means necessary to pursue this action.

As Nance convincingly shows, the “Guarantee”-dimension of property rights is based on Fichte's general view about how individuals in the state of nature may be convinced to act according to the principle of right, that is, to trust that others will not violate their rights and therefore enter the civil contract, of which the property contract is a subcontract (Nance, 2019: 651f.). The idea is that the non-violation of their rights must be guaranteed by a “third party” (FNR: 93; GA I,3: 396), namely the state. Fichte has a specific view about what form this guarantee must take. The state must, first, be organized in such a way that there are clear incentives, beyond good will, for individuals to not violate other's rights (by a punitive system, for example). This is a charitable interpretation of what Nance calls the “impossibility condition” (Nance, 2019: 651) as the reformulation of Fichte's phrase that “both [parties] would have to make it impossible, physically impossible, for themselves to violate one another” (FNR: 93; GA, I.4: 395). Second, the state must be organized in such a way that individuals trust this system of incentives (“demonstration condition”, see: Nance, 2019: 651).

I have already claimed that the right to sufficient property amounts to the right to be part of a functioning system of the division of labor. Functioning here means that this system of the division of labor, or the economy of the state, succeeds in fulfilling at least everyone's basic needs. Taking this into account, the first dimension of Fichte's understanding of guarantee sounds less preposterous: If people interfere with a functioning system of the division of labor, they risk the satisfaction of their basic needs, therefore rendering a violation of other's rights to work if not physically impossible then at least relevant to their physical survival.

Fichte's understanding of a functioning system of the division of labor is based on a tripartite division of occupations that exists in his time and that he affirms. He first distinguishes between the producers, i.e., those who are active in the agricultural sector or e.g., fishing, and the so-called artisans, by which he means handy(wo)men (from today's point of view, this group would probably also include engineers). Thirdly, he mentions merchants who trade with the products that the first two groups produce (CCS, 95f.; GA, I.7: 56ff.). Fichte believes that these three estates “are the fundamental constituent parts of a nation” (CCS, 97; GA, I.7: 58). Other occupational groups are there “only for the sake of these first three estates” (CCS, 97; GA, I.7: 58) Fichte thus sees government officials, teachers, as well as the military and the police (“Wehrstand” ¹⁸ ) as secondary occupational groups.

Let me clarify in which sense this division of labor is a distribution of (unorthodox) property, for Fichte. Regarding the first and second estates, for instance, Fichte writes that they each receive “exclusive right[s]” to activities (CCS, 95; GA, I.7: 56). The producers receive “the exclusive right to extract the products of nature” and the artisans “the exclusive right to perform further labor on this produce” (CCS, 95; GA, I.7: 56). To these exclusive rights to certain activities contracts between the groups are added that stipulate, for example, that producers must give their products to the merchants. The task of the state is, first, to monitor these contracts (CCS, 98; GA, I.7: 60), and second, to regulate the size of the respective estates such that the sufficiency threshold is fulfilled. The latter may mean, for example, that there must not be many artisans producing fancy luxury products if the need for food for all is not yet secured—i.e., there are still producers missing. The following quote illustrates this point:

Let all be sated and dwell securely before someone decorates his dwelling. Let all be comfortably and warmly clothed before anyone dresses himself sumptuously. A state where agricultural techniques have not advanced far and require many hands for their perfect application [Vervollkommnung], and that lacks even ordinary mechanical craftsmen, cannot enjoy any luxury. (CCS, 99; GA, I.7: 61)

Returning to the question of how the “Guarantee”-dimension of Fichte's unorthodox account of property leads to his ideal of a planned economy, let us consider the case of a baker in a Fichtean state (this is a modified example taken from Nance, 2019). Bakers are subgroups of the estate of artisans since they process natural products, like wheat. In a rational Fichtean state, they would have the exclusive right to produce baked goods. Individual bakers may have more specific exclusive rights. So, let us specify the example and think of a croissant baker; for simplicity, let us also assume that in 1800 he is the only croissant baker in Prussia. This baker has the exclusive right to pursue the activity of croissant baking. For Fichte, this means not only that there are no legal obstacles for this baker to bake croissants, but that he can actually bake croissants. The activity of baking croissants requires a number of things: an oven, a place to put the oven, flour, butter, and so on. Furthermore, for Fichte, even the assurance that merchants will buy his croissants is required, so that the croissant baker can live from his work. In short, it is a rather demanding matter to actually grant someone the right of ownership to the activity of croissant baking. Otherwise, according to Fichte, it is only an empty right. Thus, to secure real rights to activities, the state must have everything under its control and must not, for example, leave the supply of flour for the baker to chance—or to the market. This is why Fichte thinks a planned economy is necessary in a state constituted according to human rights, thereby also being materially constituted. ¹⁹ For Fichte, a planned (and closed) economic system also implies a particular kind of monetary policy (for more on Fichte on money, see Nance (2024) and Eich (2022: Chap. 2)).

Dimensions of global justice

In this section, I discuss three ways in which Fichte's human right to sufficient property has implications for global justice, turning his ideal of the material constitution into a global one. The three are: cosmopolitan right, the right of nations, and international commercial relations.

Cosmopolitan right

The second of two appendices of the FNR is entitled “Outline of the right of nations and cosmopolitan right,” and the discussion in this and the next subsection will be based on it. The topic of cosmopolitan right (Weltbürgerrecht), for Fichte, concerns the relation of individual A toward a state c that they are (a) not citizens of and (b1) that does not have a contract with their home state, allowing reciprocal business and travel, or (b2) that they are not sent to by their home state as an “envoy” (FNR, 332; GA, I.4: 162f.). The individual A therefore either (c1) does not belong to any state and is therefore “stateless” (Picardi, 2022: 114) or (c2) belongs to a state b that state c does not recognize. ²⁰ The question Fichte asks regarding the relation between A and c is: “Is he [A] therefore devoid of all rights, or does he indeed have any? Which rights, and on what basis?” (FNR, 333; GA, I.4: 163).

Fichte's answer is that individual A has precisely one right, “the one true human right,” ²¹ with regard to state c, “the right to be able to acquire rights” (FNR, 333; GA, I.4: 163). A person “knocking on the state's border” has “the right to demand that others expect it to be possible to enter into a rightful relation with him” (FNR, 333; GA, I.4: 163). Since Fichte thinks that offering oneself to be part of the civil contract of a state is only possible on that state's territory, he also proclaims that it is A's “right to go about freely on the earth” (FNR, 333; GA, I.4: 164). Fichte does not specify what this latter right entails concretely by addressing, for example, whether all states have to provide temporary shelters and provision of basic needs for visitors. ²²

The one true human right to acquire rights, however, does not bind a particular state to fulfill it. When A offers themselves for citizenship, state c “has the right to ask the foreigner what he wants, and to force him to explain himself” (FNR, 334; GA, I.4: 164). c has the right to deny A's offer, if (i) A doesn’t provide any reasons or (ii) if the reasons are not seen as adequate. Importantly, c's right to reject A's offer according to (ii) is dependent on two universal conditions, namely that A is thereby not “harm[ed]” and that A still has the chance to “establish a connection with another state” (FNR, 334; GA, I.4: 164).

From here, the relation between the “one true human right” and the human right to sufficient property can be explained. Recall that the human right to sufficient property is an “original right” in Fichte's terminology and that original rights are the first step of realizing the concept of right in the world, and more specifically, in a particular political community. The “one true human right” is similar to Hannah Arendt's famous concept of a “right to have rights.” It expresses the meta-right ²³ to be part of a political community in which (at least) original rights are secured. ²⁴ As we have seen, a particular state has the right to deny citizenship to a particular individual only if this individual then still has the chance to “establish a connection with another state.” With the “one true human right” in mind, we can now specify that this cannot be any state but must be one in which at least original rights are secured.

Right of nations

While Fichte's political and legal philosophy is based on universal rights, he believes that they are best realized in particular states. The one true human right to membership in a particular political community that secures original rights expresses this. Fichte provides another reason for the realization of universal right in “separate states” (FNR, 320; GA, I.4: 151), reminding the reader that the application of “right” is conditional upon there being “an actual and conscious reciprocal influence” (FNR, 321; GA, I.4: 152). Since the world is “carve[d] up” by natural borders (“oceans, rivers, and mountains”) that prevent interaction between groups of persons, the realization of right must take place in “different states” (FNR, 321; GA, I.4: 152). ²⁵

Given that universal “right” should be realized in particular states in the context of our earth, it is evident that the topic of the “right of nations” concerning the relation between distinct states, becomes a crucial element of his philosophy of right. Fichte treats this topic in the appendix to the FNR and in the CCS with a distinct focus and perspective. In FNR, Fichte is mainly interested in the legal relations between states. In the CCS, Fichte focuses on their economic relations. To be sure, the economic and legal relations between states are interdependent. Furthermore, Fichte engages the topic of the relation between states from two different perspectives. Whereas in FNR, he takes a birds-eye perspective, in CCS, he formulates desirable international (trade) relations from the perspective of one ideal-type state. ²⁶ I focus on the FNR in this section and CCS in the following one. So, how should the relations between states be organized, according to Fichte in the FNR, to realize the concept of right?

Fichte thinks that legal relations between states must be “expressly” entered into, that is contracted into (FNR, 322; GA, I.4: 152). Fichte emphasizes that states are “abstract concept[s]” (FNR, 322; GA, I.4: 152) and that therefore, the relations between citizens are what the relations between states are really about: contracts between states govern the relations between citizens of different states. Accordingly, Fichte proposes the following basic form of contracts between two states: “I make myself accountable for any injuries that my citizens might do to yours, on the condition that you are likewise accountable for any injuries that your citizens might do to mine” (FNR, 322; GA, I.4: 153). Fichte makes explicit that this amounts to states “reciprocally guaranteeing one another the property rights of their citizens” (FNR, 324; GA, I.4: 155). Crucially, such a contract is based on the “reciprocal recognition” of the states (FNR, 322; GA, I.4: 153). The condition of possibility of a state entering into a contract with another state is that the former recognizes the latter (and vice versa) as displaying “legality” (FNR, 322; GA, I.4: 153) or “a rightful constitution at all” (FNR, 323; GA, I.4: 154). What does “legality” mean? In my view, for Fichte, the to-be-recognized state must be one that realizes the concept of right to a minimal extent, namely by at least securing original rights. ²⁷ A state that displays “legality” must, according to Fichte, be one that “can speak on behalf of its citizens” (FNR, 322; GA, I.4: 153). A state that does not guarantee the minimum conditions of livelihood through original rights cannot be taken to act “on behalf of its citizens.” This also becomes clear in a different context in which Fichte argues that citizens have no duty to obey the property laws of a state if these, in turn, do not guarantee their basic needs:

if someone is unable to make a living from his labor, he has not been given what is absolutely his, […] he is no longer obligated by right to recognize anyone else's property. (FNR, 186; GA, I.3: 186) ²⁸

Fichte's view on the right of nations regarding property can be summarized as follows: States may enter into contracts with each other that have as their content the mutual guarantee of the other citizens’ property rights. This contract is based on the condition that the states in question (already) guarantee minimum property to their citizens, and thereby realize their human right to sufficient property (“legality”).

Since this is an important topic for recent theories of human rights, let me briefly comment on what this means for the question of the justifiability of external interventions (cf. Raz, 2010: 328). On my interpretation, Fichte can be roughly aligned with the “political” in contrast to the “orthodox” camp in the current debate (on this debate, see Etinson, 2018). In “political” accounts, the violation of human rights is the threshold beyond which external intervention is legitimate. For Fichte, in general, “[i]t is none of its [a state's] business to inquire about the other state's inner constitution” (FNR, 323; GA, I.4: 153). However, if another state does not even display “legality,” i.e., does not secure original rights, then it cannot be recognized as a sovereign state, thereby making external intervention permissible. The permissibility of external intervention is not equivalent to an obligation to intervene. An obligation could, on the one hand, be yielded by the exigency to protect one's own citizens from the external danger of “rightless people.” On the other hand, the question arises whether on Fichte's account it is also required to intervene if it is (empirically) likely that an intervention would advance the protection of the “one true human right” of the individuals in the polity not displaying legality, i.e., contributing to them being part of a polity that secures “original rights.” This question cannot be answered only with reference to Fichte's text. Inferring such an obligation from Fichte's account does, however, seem to be in the spirit of his thinking, since it is not by accident that he insisted on the existence of one human right.

[War, Peace, and Confederation] So far, we have been concerned with the horizontal relation between independent states. Fichte also proposes an international institution in the FNR, namely a “confederation” of nations (FNR, 329; GA, I.4: 160), which has the goal of achieving peace on a global scale.

But when is war likely to occur for Fichte? To begin with, when does a state have the right to pursue war regarding another state? First, as we have seen concerning intervention above, states have the right to wage war against another if they do not reciprocally recognize one another as displaying “legality.” Second, a right of war is obtained through “a violation of the contract” between states (FNR, 327; GA, I.4: 157).

Regarding the likelihood of contract breaches, Fichte sees the confederation as one way of reducing this risk. I will come back to this below. A “clearly and unambiguously formulated” (FNR, 326; GA, I.4: 157) contract also serves this purpose. This, in turn, is made possible by “it […] never encompass[ing] a large number of provisions” (FNR, 326; GA, I.4: 157) According to Fichte, the relations between states should be relatively minimal, reducing the possibilities for “misunderstanding” (FNR, 326; GA, I.4: 157.) in the future (this sets the stage for the ideal of the “closed” state in CCS). If the conditions of the contract are prone to misunderstanding, one party might accuse the other of a breach of contract, thereby gaining its right to war. Simple and clear contracts between states are therefore desirable for Fichte by virtue of being conducive to peace.

The precise problem that the confederation is supposed to be a solution to is the following. As we have seen, Fichte thinks that a state would have the right to wage war against another, if, for example, the latter had breached their reciprocal contract. ²⁹ Now the problem is that the right to war is not automatically accompanied with “as much power as it has right” (FNR, 329; GA, I.4: 159). In order to put “right” and “power” into an adequate proportion, Fichte thinks that that “several states […] have to confederate for the purpose of maintaining rightful relations among themselves” (FNR, 329; GA, I.4: 159). Fichte is confident that this confederation would “always [be] victorious” (FNR, 329; GA, I.4: 160). However, he is aware that it is not “absolutely impossible for the assembled people to render an unjust verdict” while being “the judge who seems least capable” “of erring or having a bad will” (FNR, 331; GA, I.4: 162). Establishing and expanding such a confederation is therefore the best bet for achieving “perpetual peace” (FNR, 331; GA, I.4: 162).

War is, of course, detrimental to the realization of the minimum of rightfulness expressed in the two original rights: bodily inviolability and property sufficient to secure one's livelihood.

International commercial relations

Fichte's view on desirable international commercial relations is laid out in CCS, in particular the first book thereof. In short, Fichte's view is that a rational state should be economically independent, reducing international trade to a minimum. This view of the international dimension of trade is based on Fichte's poisition on how the economy should be organized within the state, namely as a planned economy.

The explicit question Fichte aims to answer in the first book of CCS is “what is Right with respect to [international] ³⁰ commerce [Handelsverkehrs] in the rational state” (CCS, 89; GA, I.7: 53). Fichte is applying his theory of right as developed in FNR to the topic of international commerce or trade. Nevertheless, Fichte's entire economic philosophy—albeit on a relatively undetailed level—is formulated in CCS. Certain topics he treats in CCS that are not about international commerce in particular are, however, also already treated in FNR (such as his property theory and account of the desirable division of labor).

Apart from this explicit question Fichte aims to answer in CCS, Isaac Nakhimovsky (2011) has argued that Fichte is offering a position in the debate concerning perpetual peace in which Kant, among others, took part. Following Friedrich von Gentz, Nakhimovsky distinguishes three answers to the question of how perpetual peace may be achieved that were available in the discussion: (i) “a world state”; (ii) “a world in which humanity remained divided into multiple states if these states were thoroughly separated and had nothing to fight over”; and (iii) “some form of international federation” (Nakhimovsky, 2011: 63). While Fichte's position (in CCS) is associated with the second position by Nakhimovsky, we have seen that in FNR Fichte proposes a confederation, aligning his position with the third answer. While it may therefore seem that Fichte contradicts himself or changed his mind, I do not believe this is the case. First, one must distinguish between the political/legal and the economic relations Fichte regards as desirable between states. Furthermore, recall that the contracts that Fichte envisages between states (which the confederation ought to oversee) are very limited. Therefore, Fichte's ideal of a (political and legal) confederation of states is indeed compatible with his view that a rational state should be economically independent.

So far, I have only stated that Fichte's ideal of international trade is minimalist. But why does he think so? In order to understand this, we have to reconsider Fichte's ideal of a planned economy within a state. Why must a rationally organized economy be closed in addition to being planned? If the state, to protect the property rights of the citizens, must control all economic activity, so that the croissant baker, for example, can be guaranteed the supply of flour, then the state must restrict economic relations to its domain. If the croissant baker depended on English flour, then the Prussian king could not assure him of it. Fichte writes:

The state is obliged to guarantee for all its citizens, through law and compulsion [Zwang], the state of affairs that results from this balance of commerce. Yet it cannot do this if there is any person able to influence this balance who does not stand under the state's law and command. Thus, it must cut the very possibility of such influence off at the root. –– All commerce with foreigners must be forbidden to its subjects and rendered impossible. […] And thus, just as the rational state is a closed realm of laws and individuals, it is also an entirely closed commercial state. (CCS, 107f.; GA, I.7: 69).

Regardless of Fichte's specific ideal of how a state should be internally organized, he makes the more general point that a lack of congruence between political-legal and economic organizational units is problematic. He writes: “everyone who does not stand under the same legislation and power of coercion should be excluded from participating in this commerce” (CCS, 79; GA, I.7: 38).

Fichte's ideal of economically independent states is connected to a distinct conception of natural borders or “natural boundaries of empires [Reiche]” (CCS, 169; GA, I.7: 117). They are related to the natural resources of a territory and are drawn where “productive independence and self-sufficiency” (CCS, 169; GA, I.7: 117) is possible. Note that this definition is distinct from the one concerning geographical entities like mountains that I cited above. Respecting these borders, especially by refraining from expansion, according to Fichte, is conducive to peace:

If war is to be eliminated, the reason for war must be eliminated. Each state must obtain what it aims to obtain through war, and which, reasonably, is the only thing it can aim at: its natural borders. When this is accomplished, it will have nothing more to seek from another state, since it possesses what it wanted. Since it has not advanced beyond its natural borders into the borders of another state, no other state has anything to seek from it. (CCS, 170; GA, I.7: 118f.)

Probing Fichte's global material constitution

In this section, I present a tableau of the tensions and potentially undesirable consequences that thinking through Fichte's global material constitution reveal with regard to Fichte's political and legal philosophy, as well as the conceptual and political project of combining human rights and socialist economics (“moral socialism”) in general. It is divided into four subsections.

The first two present Fichte's views on globalization and the freedom of movement of individuals (migration and tourism). The aim of these sections is to show that with Fichte we can see that certain restrictions of freedom in this context might indeed be in line with the project of “moral socialism.” In other words, reading Fichte might help us see genuine trade-offs between freedom and equality as well as material security, implying the virtue of modesty. However, Fichte's own thinking often seems to go one step too far, trading freedom for parochialism.

The second two sections address two conceptual tensions that the topical discussion of globalization and freedom of movement have brought to the fore, namely between freedom and security as well as cosmopolitanism and nationalism. These tensions have previously been examined with regard to Fichte's political and legal philosophy. Previous work focused on the domestic respectively cultural level. I add the global and material dimension to this discussion.

Fichte's critique of economic globalization

Some passages in the CCS sound like a radical and largely plausible left critique of globalization avant la lettre (cf. Picardi, 2022: 113; Jörke, 2019: ch. 6). Fichte insists that economic global relations should not develop and flourish independently of legal regulations or on terms dictated by one party. ³¹ Accordingly, Fichte is acutely aware of the potential of exploitation of one nation by another through trade (CCS, 169f.; GA, I.7: 117f.). ³² In fact, he thinks that importing goods is usually only profitable for the importing state due to exploitative labor conditions at the site of production. Additionally, he aims to rebut the claim that imported goods are hard to relinquish. ³³ Consider Fichte's remarks about a possible abandonment of imported cotton:

[...] our age has become quite accustomed to cotton fabrics. They provide some comforts, and to abolish them completely might well cause some hardship. Yet true cotton does not grow in northern lands, and it cannot be counted on that the residents of the lands in which it grows will continue to let us have it unprocessed. Accordingly, I would certainly demand that a northern state that is closing forbid the import of Indian, Levantine, and Maltese cotton, yet without depriving us of cotton fabric. But don’t many kinds of grass, shrubs, and trees in our climate yield wool that is just as pure, and that can’t be refined even further through cultivation? I recall having heard that a number of years ago in the Oberlausitz a piece of fabric was manufactured purely from domestic produce that was equal to or better than the best foreign cotton. (CCS, 202, note v, from p. 188; GA, I.7: 132)

Fichte's main aim in this passage is to argue that eschewing imported products does not amount to a significant reduction of prosperity and pleasure. However, as the following quote expresses, he also advances a normative view that modesty is valuable: “everyone should be content with what is yielded by the climate in which he dwells and the art of his fellow citizens among whom he lives” (CCS, 165; GA, I.7: 115; my emphasis). As we shall see, this recommendation of modesty compromises our freedom.

Fichte is exclusively opposed to economic globalization, in fact he believes that international exchange on the levels of science, culture, and institutional design (non-economic globalization) may only flourish if it is not corrupted by material interests: ³⁴

Once this system [of closed commercial states] has become universal and eternal peace is established among different peoples, there is not a single state on the face of the earth that will have the slightest interest in keeping its discoveries from any other, since each will only use these for its own needs inside its boundaries, and not to oppress other states and provide itself with superiority over them. Nothing, it follows, will prevent the scholars and artists of all nations from entering into the freest communication with one another. The public papers will no longer contain stories of wars and battles, peace treaties or alliances, for all these things will have vanished from the world. They will only contain news of the advances of sciences, of new discoveries, of progress in legislation and the police, and each state will hasten to make itself home to the inventions of others. (CCS, 199; GA, I.7: 141)

Fichte on the freedom of movement (migration and tourism)

Fichte's views on the (un)freedom of movement of individuals may be separated into four aspects: (i) the perspective of the state toward individuals seeking citizenship or refuge, (ii) the perspective of the state regarding the attraction of skilled workers, (iii) the emigration of citizens, and (iv) travel. Here, I will only discuss the first and last aspects, which I believe might enrich contemporary discussions. ³⁵

In recent literature, Fichte's view has been located with regard to the politically sensitive question whether it allows a distinction between so-called “political” and “economic” refugees. Both the position, that the distinction between “political” and “economic” refugees may be justified in reference to Fichte (Jörke, 2019: 219ff.), and, that it collapses from a Fichtean perspective, is held (Picardi, 2022: 123). As I will show, I think a middle position between Jörke and Picardi is more accurate to Fichte's text. Fichte's non-explicit position on refugees must be gained from his short remarks on cosmopolitan right. As I laid out above, for Fichte, a state may only reject a stranger, if they have another chance to fulfill their human right to sufficient property. The rights granted to the refuge seeking person in this Fichtean picture show that the distinction between political and economic refugees is undercut: Their political meta-right to be part of a state that secures at least the economic right to sufficient property is at stake. ³⁶ Recall that the latter involves being able to live from one's labor.

However, for Fichte, emigrating for the economic reason of wanting to be part of a different system of the division of labor, although one's present system does fulfill one's basic needs, is not an obligating reason for any state. Recall Fichte's case for replacing imported cotton with fiber from local plants. With Fichte, one could argue that the right to sufficient property in a state would involve having a job in the division of labor that gives one access to clothes or fabrics to make clothes. Someone asking for citizenship in a state and making their case by reference to the fact that they do not have access to (e.g., warm enough) clothes where they come from would therefore be a good argument, from Fichte's perspective. In contrast, an argument that a state would not have to accept, according to Fichte, is: “I come from a state where I have sufficient clothes, but these are made from silk, and I don’t like silk, so I’d like to become a citizen of your state where you dress in cord and linen.” For Fichte, persons do not have a right to simply live where they want for reasons that do not concern their basic needs.

(iv) Fichte's views on the permissibility of individual travel by citizens of a rational closed commercial state is very restrictive:

Only the scholar and the higher artist will have to travel outside the closed commercial state. Idle curiosity and the restless hunt for distraction should no longer be allowed to tote their boredom from land to land. The travels of the scholar and the higher artist happen for the benefit of humanity and the state, and the government, far from trying to prevent these trips, should even encourage them, sending scholars and artists on trips at public expense. (CCS, 193; GA, I.7: 137)

While the prohibition of travel for commerce might seem far-fetched from today's perspective, it is clearly implied by Fichte's ideal of a closed commercial state. Having already discussed this ideal at length, Fichte's remarks on the restriction of touristic travel to scholars and higher artists merits greater attention here. While Fichte's concrete position is illiberal and therefore undesirable, questioning the cultural value of (excessive) touristic travel is, in fact, a pertinent issue today, both for ecological reasons as well as considerations pertaining to the good life (Callard, 2023). The radicality of Fichte's illiberal view might be mitigated by the following two internal critiques: First, granted that travel should only be for scholarly and artistic reasons, why shouldn’t all citizens be able to pursue such travels (once in a while)? The elitism of Fichte's position is unjustified. Second, granted that travel for the sake of commerce is forbidden, why is travel for the sake of leisure forbidden? This question is especially pertinent since Fichte, especially in his later 1812 Rechtslehre, does appreciate the value of leisure time outside of work for realizing the basic principle of his philosophy of right, namely freedom (James, 2015: 517f.; cf. Blumenfeld, 2023: ch. 2; Heisenberg, 2022). ³⁷

Secure freedom?

The problem that Fichte's legal and political philosophy ends up illiberal, despite starting out from freedom, has been observed regarding the domestic sphere of the state. ³⁸ Here, I show how this problem arises with regard to global material constitution.

As the remarks on globalization and migration have already suggested, Fichte endorses modesty as a virtue that may counterbalance an overemphasis on individual freedom. Consider his following remark:

Why shouldn’t the goods I receive be as perfect as those manufactured in some other country?—To ask this is like asking: “Why aren’t I the resident of a different country?” And this means about as much as if the oak should ask, Why aren’t I a palm-tree? or vice versa. Everyone must be content with the sphere in which nature has put him, and with all that follows from this sphere. (CCS, 100f.; GA, I.7: 62)

While the modesty expressed in this quote—to be happy with what one has—might at the very least be psychologically healthy, it risks overly compromising freedom. This becomes particular clear in a different context, namely Fichte's remarks on gender, in which he appeals to the diffidence of women regarding their passive role in courting. If women ask why they cannot take initiative and court men, “[i]t is as if one were to ask whether the human being might not have the same right to fly as the bird” (FNR: 268; GA, I.4: 99).

Fichte anticipated and aimed to dissipate such freedom related objections in a chapter with the following title in CCS: “The actual reason why one will take offense at the theory we have presented” (Third Book, Eigth Chapter). This reason is to “wish to play and madly swarm to and fro with its fantasy, and since there are few other means available to satisfy this play-urge, it has a strong inclination to turn life itself into a game” (CCS, 197; GA, I.7: 140). With regard to proponents of this reason, Fichte also writes:

It delights them more to strive for things cunningly than to possess them securely. […] Whatever aims at strict regularity and at things taking a firmly ordered, thoroughly uniform course will appear to them as an infringement on their natural freedom. (CCS, 198; GA, I.7: 140)

While I admire Fichte's radical emphasis on the importance of securing basic needs for everyone, ³⁹ he seems to contradict the very foundations of his philosophy of right. In the FNR, he holds the view that humanity is essentially characterized by “natural,” in the sense of undetermined, existential, or rule-less freedom: “Every animal is what it is: only the human being is originally nothing at all” (FNR, 74; GA, I.3: 379). Property is first brought into the picture in the FNR in order to enable free activity. The security of basic needs was initially supposed to be instrumental to freedom in Fichte's picture but seems to have become an end in itself in CCS.

Note that inhibiting individual freedom might be less problematic if institutions were infallible and would always act such that net freedom is increased. However, Fichte explicitly acknowledges their fallibility: there is “only one objection that could be made to our proposal that seems important” which is that the state becomes too powerful, that the citizens “become dependent on the unlimited free license (Willkür) of their rulers” (CCS, 181; GA, I.7, 126; cf. FNR, 331; GA, I.4: 162). ⁴⁰ In two senses Fichte aims to salvage freedom and provide an adequate response to the fallibility of states. Internationally, by recommending a “confederation” instead of a “world state.” Domestically, Fichte foresees the “ephorate” as an institution to control executive state power (FNR, 141; GA, I,3: 440). These safeguards, however, do not go very far.

Cosmopolitan nationalism?

Fichte's cosmopolitan nationalism has received some recent attention on the level of culture (Farr, 2016: James, 2020). ⁴¹ Here I add the material dimension of Fichte's position between cosmopolitanism and nationalism.

Generally, Fichte seems to think that the universal human right to sufficient property can be best realized in economically independent particular states. This does not seem to imply a nationalistic position in any problematic sense, involving a hierarchy between different nations states or essentialist understandings of nationality or cultural identity. This unproblematic view is associated with one of three accounts of natural borders between states that can be found in Fichte's work. Accordingly, natural borders track the borders within which a territory can be economically self-sufficient. In the Addresses to the German Nation [AGN], however, Fichte provides a linguistic definition of natural borders that is likely culturally essentialist. ⁴² He writes:

the first, original and truly natural frontiers of states are undoubtedly their inner frontiers. Those who speak the same language are already, before all human art, joined together by mere nature with a multitude of invisible ties. (AGN, 166; GA, I.10: 267)

Regarding the material or economic focus of this paper, it is of interest, whether this account of natural borders is somehow implied by the economic one or whether Fichte simply changed his mind (or is focusing on a different aspect which is distinct but compatible with the economic account of natural borders). If it were implied, further questions concerning the illiberal character of the CCS would arise: Does Fichte's political economy really carry through the universalist and human rights-centered foundation as laid out in FNR?

While I do not think that Fichte's culturalist understanding of borders is implied by the self-sufficiency account of natural borders, I do think it would be worth further interrogating whether this is implied by Fichte's theory of value and money in the CCS. Fichte thinks that there is an objective value to goods in a society, which the value of money should track. Value comes from two distinct facts: The time one can live by a certain good and/or the value that it has relative to the particular community (cf. CCS, First Book, Second Chapter, V; GA, I.7: 65–69). The latter criterion seems to imply the need for a relatively homogenous community of persons to whom this price applies. The step from securing cultural homogeneity to postulating a cultural essence then seems a small one.

Conclusion

I have reconstructed Fichte's global material constitution by first elucidating that his account of human rights, and the human right to sufficient property in particular, implies a particular constitution of the economy, namely a planned one. Then, I examined the principles of global justice yielded by the human right to sufficient property. These can be summarized as follows: Every human has the meta-right to live in a minimally rightful state, which realizes the right to sufficient property. States can therefore only deny membership to an individual if they consequently still have the opportunity to fulfill their meta-right elsewhere. The human right to sufficient property is best realized in particular, economically self-sufficient states. These states should relate to each other such that they respect and secure the property rights institutionalized in each. They should not interfere in each other's internal affairs unless a state does not fulfill the human right to sufficient property. The third section offered a tableau of tensions and potentially undesirable implications of Fichte's global material constitution, with an eye toward Fichte's political and legal philosophy as a whole and contemporary ambitions to construct an ideal of a “(global) material constitution” or “moral socialism.” To further examine these tensions, both internally within Fichte's work and regarding their relation to today's political and political-theoretic debates, remains a desideratum for further research. Regarding the latter, I hope that this article might spark some attention to Fichte from political theorists and philosophers with no prior (historical) interest in his work.