Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès (3 May 1748 – 20 June 1836), commonly known as the Abbé Sieyès, was a French Roman Catholic clergyman and political writer.
A leading theorist of the French Revolution, Sieyès wrote the pamphlet What Is the Third Estate in 1789, when he represented the Third Estate in the Estates-General. In the pamphlet, he claimed that the Third Estate had no actual political power, even though it constituted a nation, and had no need for the other two estates.[1]
By 1799, Sieyès had become a Director in the French government and worked with Napoleon Bonaparte to overthrow the government. Afterwards, the Directory was dissolved and the Consulate dictatorship was established.[2]