The Historical School: From Friedrich List to the Social Market Economy. Zemfira Nazarova
materials; but the fact that, in spite of these errors, thanks to his system industry has risen, no enlightened and open-minded historian would dare to deny. It must be clear to every mind, alien to prejudice and not clouded by false doctrinal considerations, that it was not so much by its conquests as by its wise measures for the promotion of agriculture, industry, and commerce, by its successes in literature and science, that Prussia was able to occupy a place among the European states. And all this was the work of one great genius alone!»11. The development of the economy was also hindered by continuous wars that strengthened the power of the military feudal bureaucracy. It should be noted that the future King of Prussia, in the early years of life, and did not dream of the crown, because he was the third son in the family, but his two brothers died, opening the way to the throne. Since childhood, Karl Friedrich was fond of philosophy, literature, music, dance, composition. He played the flute beautifully. There is a well-known historical fact of his music-making in the palace of Sans Souci with the great Johann Sebastian Bach, whose son worked as a harpsichordist at the court of the King of Prussia. The Prussian king was fluent in English, French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese, and read Greek, Ancient Greek and Latin. Karl Friedrich II can be considered an outstanding representative of the Hohenzollern dynasty, whose nickname combined the sympathy of the Germans for their king and the recognition of his statesmanship. The Russian Empress Elizabeth Petrovna called him «the Prussian Nadir Shah», her nephew Peter III called him «one of the world’s greatest heroes», and Voltaire, with whom Friedrich corresponded, called him «the northern Solomon». And also, criticizing the science of management Machiavelli, the Prussian king notes, «we must always remember that in the world there is nothing perfect and that the error is inherent in all people. The happiest is the state, where mutual care of the sovereign and subjects make public life pleasant and easy, without which human existence becomes an obnoxious burden»12.
The end of the 18th century and the first half of the 19th century in the history of European philosophy is usually called classical German philosophy. During this period, the center of development of spiritual culture moves from France to Germany: German writers Johann Gottfried Herder, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Johann Friedrich Schiller; musicians Christoph Willibald Gluck, Ludwig van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, continuing the culture of the French Enlightenment, contribute to the development of German classical philosophy and German romanticism. Among the brightest representatives of German classical philosophy should be highlighted philosopher and public figure Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762—1814) and his work «Closed commercial state» (1800) – one of the interesting concepts of the ideal state, in which he attempted to realize the main provisions of the social ideal of the second half of 90-ies of the XVIII century – by radical reforms carried out «from above» and the peculiarity of which was to implement it within a single country.
Having given up the career of a Lutheran pastor with a relatively secure existence, imbued in his university years with the ideas of anti-clerical freethinking, philosopher and public figure Johann Gottlieb Fichte hoped through the development of the doctrine of human freedom to influence the change in the social life of people in the modern world, which he assessed as completely intolerable. Acquaintance with Kant’s works (in 1780 he visited him in Königsberg) contributed to the formation of his philosophical outlook. He can be considered one of the brightest representatives of subjective idealism, which developed, among other things, on the basis of Kant’s theoretical and ethical works. Fichte believed that the Great French Revolution (1789) was prepared not only by the works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, but also by Kant. According to Fichte, it was Kant’s philosophy, especially its ethical part, that first proved the reality of freedom.
In 1800, Fichte wrote, as he notes in the subtitle, a philosophical project that would serve as a supplement to the science of law and an attempt to construct a forthcoming policy for the creation of the concept of an ideal state under the title «The Closed Commercial State». In the preliminary explanation of the title, Fichte notes that «the state of law is a closed set of many people, subject to the same laws and the same supreme coercive power», and further notes in the introduction: «Whoever wishes to show to what special laws trade relations should be subjected in the state, must therefore first of all investigate what in the state of reason, in the field of trade relations, is consistent with law, and then indicate what is the custom in this respect in the currently existing state?13. Fichte writes: «A state which still has a backward agriculture, which needs a considerable number of hands for its improvement, which lacks the usual mechanical crafts, cannot allow itself luxury. Fichte believes that «man must work, but not like a pack animal, which sinks into sleep under his burden and, after a meager recovery of exhausted strength, again forced to carry the same burden. He must work fearlessly, willingly and joyfully.» A full-fledged citizen of man makes possession of property, «every adult and reasonable person must have property» believes Fichte. He notes that «the purpose of the state is, first of all, to give everyone his own, to bring him into possession of his property, and then to begin to protect it.14 If the state ensures that every citizen has property, it can demand rights in relations between people. People themselves choose, each for himself, the field of activity, and the state must ensure them the right to labor and to property. At the same time, labor was seen not only as a vital necessity of each person, but also as his indispensable duty. In Fichte’s «closed commercial state» there are three estates: producers («extract natural works of nature»), artists (perform «further processing for final destination») and merchants. Speaking of national welfare, he notes: «Welfare should extend to all in approximately the same degree»15. Highlighting the need for an active role of the state in the economy and human life, Fichte opposes pure market regulation of the economy, considering it inevitably leading to an imbalance of various types of labor activity, to the unemployment of a significant part of the population and poverty.
Fichte was born in Rahmenau (East Prussia) into a peasant family. Through patronage he received a university education, studying at the University of Jena (1780) and the University of Leipzig (1780—1784).
At the beginning of 1794 Fichte gives private lectures on «science» in Zurich, the rumor of which reached Germany and on the initiative of Goethe he is invited to the University of Jena as a professor, where he worked until 1799. In 1805 Fichte lectured at the University of Erlangen, and in 1806 – Königsberg University.
From 1800 Fichte lived and worked mainly in Berlin; in 1810 he was appointed dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and was soon elected rector of the university. In 1814 he died of typhoid fever, contracted from his wife while caring for sick and wounded soldiers in a hospital.
Fichte’s works influenced many contemporaries, such as the young F. Schelling, Johann W. Goethe, W. von Humboldt, F. and A. Schlegel, F. Schiller, Novalis. The symbol of the epoch became, published in 1808, «Speeches to the German nation» Fichte, in which the idea of a united German fatherland was gaining popularity. Fichte can be considered the philosopher whose ideas served as a bridge between the ideas of the great hermit Kant and the great dialectician Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.
Completely opposite in content is another work, «The Isolated State» (1826), in which an abstract model of the state is created by Johann Heinrich von Thünen (1783—1850), a Mecklenburg junker (landowner), a mathematician by training, one of the predecessors of the «Marginalist revolution» and the founders of mathematical methods of limit analysis in economic theory, who created the theory of the isolated state («Der isolierte Staat»), which led to the emergence of the abstract theory of the psychological and mathematical school on the Austro-German soil in the 80s of the Х1st century. His mathematical constructions in this respect also foreshadowed the direction that in the twentieth century came to be called «econometrics». The full title of the work is
List, F. National system of political economy. – M.: Chelyabinsk: 2017. – Pg. 128—129
Ibid. – Pg. 144
Fichte, I.G. The Closed Commercial State: A Philosophical Project, which serves as a supplement to the science of law and an attempt to build a future policy. Per. from German. – M.: KRASAND, 2019 – Pg. 14
Ibid. – Pg. 17
Ibid. – Pg. 45