Call for Papers
OPEN CALL FOR PAPERS
Thematic Section: Vol. 30, no. 1, 2026
Fichte y la revolución francesa
Edited by Silvestre Gristina and Lucas Damián Scarfia
E-mail: silvestre.gristina@unipd.it / lucas.d.scarfia@uv.es
Submission deadline: May 30, 2026
According to the broadest historical-philosophical interpretations, the French Revolution is the most significant political event of the eighteenth century, and its influence proved decisive both for the development of nineteenth-century European philosophy and for modern—and even contemporary—social, political, economic, and moral transformations. In the context of late eighteenth-century Germany, still not officially unified, and in opposition to the majority of intellectuals who, especially after the period of the Terror, criticized and rejected the revolutionary movement, Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814) recovered the libertarian philosophical meaning of the Revolution. Moreover, Fichte equated the revolutionary historical event with the also revolutionary philosophical event implied by his own system of thought, the Wissenschaftslehre. This is recorded in the famous letter to Baggesen of April/May 1795, in which he states: “My system is the first system of freedom. Just as this nation [France] freed humanity from its external chains, my system freed it from the yoke of the thing in itself […] and its first principles make the human being an autonomous being.”
In turn, Fichte’s perspective on the Revolution manifests itself in a particular way—and in discussion with A. W. Rehberg’s (1757–1836) Untersuchungen über die Französische Revolution (1793)—in his work, at times dismissed by part of the historiography as a mere pamphlet, Beitrag zur Berichtigung der Urtheile des Publicums über die französische Revolution (1793), which forms part of his Revolutionsschriften, together above all with Zurückforderung der Denkfreiheit von den Fürsten Europens die sie bisher unterdrückten (1793). As is explicitly stated in the title, Fichte sets out to rectify public judgment concerning the Revolution. This rectification leads to the exposition of a line of thought which, although at times dense, is extremely rich conceptually with regard to how, according to the philosopher, relations among human beings ought to be configured. In doing so, Fichte incorporates into his reflection core concepts of the modern philosophical-political tradition—such as the state, the rule of law, coercion, violence, power, obedience, punishment, fear, war, justice/injustice, among others—and brings to light the difficulties that the political-state organization of human coexistence poses precisely for human beings themselves. In this sense, Fichte reclaims the French Revolution, especially insofar as it offers moral instruction and a didactic framework with regard to human rights and human worth.
With this issue, the Revista de Estud(i)os sobre Fichte / Rivista di studi su Fichte seeks to continue and expand the work that, in recent years, various specialists from different regions and universities have carried out and presented at conferences and academic meetings. The aim is thus to strengthen the exegesis of a period and a set of works within the Fichtean corpus that, relatively speaking, have not received the same level of bibliographical attention as other, later texts by the author.
Proposed lines of inquiry, though not mutually exclusive, include:
- The sense in which Fichte reads the French Revolution in relation to the possibility of peoples modifying their political constitution.
- The relationship between the moral and political spheres as described by Fichte in the Beitrag.
- Fichte’s proto-anarchism in the Beitrag.
- The contrast between Fichte’s philosophical-political positions in his Revolutionsschriften and in other, later texts of his practical philosophy.
- The contrast in Fichte’s view of the French nation between the Revolution and the Napoleonic advance.
- The relationship between the French Revolution as a historical event and the Wissenschaftslehre as a philosophical event.
- The intellectual debate contemporary with Fichte regarding the Revolution, involving figures such as Edmund Burke, A. W. Rehberg, Friedrich von Gentz, Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, among others.
- Contemporary philosophical-political readings of Fichte’s interpretation of the Revolution.
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
Manuscripts must be submitted by May 30, 2026, exclusively through the journal’s OJS platform. Authors are required to register or log in and then upload the requested materials.
The maximum length for articles is 10,000 words. The journal’s preferred languages are English, Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese. For citation and bibliographic reference formats, please refer to the Publication Guidelines section on the journal’s website.
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PERMANENT CFP for the “Varia” section
The “Varia” section of the Rivista di studi su Fichte welcomes contributions that are thematically independent from the thematic section that characterizes each issue of the journal. Submissions may be sent to the editorial board at any time, regardless of the deadlines associated with the thematic Call for Papers.
Manuscripts (maximum 10,000 words) must be submitted anonymously via the OJS platform by selecting the VARIA section. Submissions must be accompanied by an abstract (maximum 1,000 characters, including spaces) and 5 keywords. In addition to Italian, contributions may be written in Spanish, Portuguese, or English. All submissions will undergo double-blind peer review.
