Summons and Counter-Summons: Machiavelli, Rhetoric, and Political Intervention in Fichte’s Later Thought (1807–1813)

Abstract

This paper examines the profound impact of Machiavelli’s oeuvre on Fichte, focusing in particular on the writings and lectures that followed his 1807 essay published in the patriotic journal Vesta. It argues that Fichte’s rehabilitation of Machiavelli exceeds occasional or purely exegetical commentary and instead reveals the core features of his political philosophy, as well as the inherently political character of his philosophical praxis. The analysis is developed through the category of “summons” ( Aufforderung ), first introduced in Foundations of Natural Right (1796), and through the notion of “rhetoric of summons” as the basic structural principle of the Addresses to the German Nation . Originally conceived as a call issued by one subject to another, inviting the latter to actualize their free efficacy, the summons articulates an educational rather than a strictly juridical relation. Through the rhetoric of summons, Oesterreich and Traub identify the fundamental structure of the Addresses , insofar as it prepares the rhetorical constitution of a people within the sphere of political and popular public opinion. I contend that the concept and the rhetoric of summons are pivotal for understanding the rhetorical-political dimension of Fichte’s later works, including the essay On Machiavelli , the Addresses to the German Nation , and the Lectures on Applied Philosophy . These texts can be read as “counter-summonses” or “counter-interpellations” aimed at mobilizing their audience against the dominant governmental discourse of the time. In this way, Fichte’s political writings during the Wars of Liberation (1807–1813) emerge as a coherent project of ideological and political intervention, culminating in the figure of the Zwingherr .