Fichte's System of Ethics

The System of Ethics was published at the height of Fichte's academic career and marks the culmination of his philosophical development in Jena. Much more than a treatise on ethics narrowly construed, the System of Ethics presents a unified synthesis of Fichte's core philosophical ideas, including the principle I-hood, self-activity and self-consciousness, and also contains his most detailed treatment of action and agency. This volume brings together an international group of leading scholars on Fichte, and is the first of its kind in English to offer critical and interpretive perspectives on this work, covering topics such as normativity, belief, justification, desire, duty, and the ethical life. It will be an essential guide for scholars wanting to deepen their understanding of Fichte's ethical thought, as well as for those interested in the history of ethics more broadly.

Stefano Bacin is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Milan. He is the author of Il senso dell'etica. Kant e la costruzione di una teoria morale (2006) and Fichte in Schulpforta (1774-1780) (2007). He is co-editor of a three-volume Kant-Lexikon (with Marcus Willaschek, Georg Mohr and Jürgen Stolzenberg, 2015) and The Emergence of Autonomy in Kant's Moral Philosophy (with Oliver Sensen, Cambridge, 2019). Owen Ware is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto. He is the author of Kant's Justification of Ethics (forthcoming), and Fichte's Moral Philosophy (2020), and has written numerous articles on Fichte and Kant in journals such as the European Journal of Philosophy and Mind.