https://medium.com/@jimfarmelant/marxism-and-functionalism-9ccd770a908e
As I see it, on the one hand, Marxism does rely upon functionalist explanations of social phenomena. In that sense, one can characterize Marxism, or at least the materialist conception of history, as a form of functionalism. But if by functionalism, one means the sort of social theory that was put forth by people like Durkheim, or Malinowski, or Radcliffe-Brown, or Talcott Parsons, then Marxists clearly do reject functionalisms of that sort. The Canadian/British philosopher, G. A. Cohen in his book *Karl Marx’s Theory of History: A Defence* ( https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08713MXZM/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 ) presented a critique of functionalist social theories along the following lines. As Cohen saw it, functionalist social theories like the ones put forth by Durkheim or Parsons posit: (1) that all elements of social life are interconnected such that they strongly influence one another so as to ‘form one inseparable whole.’ (2) all elements of social life support or reinforce one another, and hence the whole society in aggregate which they constitute. (3) each element is as it is because of its contribution to the whole. Cohen argued that thesis (2) is falsified by the conflict, strain, and crisis that is endemic to many societies and is in any case to be rejected as viciously conservative. And likewise theses (1) and (3) will be rejected by most Marxists. Nevertheless, Cohen argued that the rejection of theses of classical functionalism need not entail the rejection of reliance upon functional explanations in the social sciences. Furthermore, in Cohen’s interpretation of Marxism, historical materialism is seen as reliant upon functional explanations. Historical materialism embraces a type of functionalism that is revolutionary in that it predicts large-scale social transformations and it claims that their course is necessarily violent. Forms of society are said to rise and fall in accordance to their advancing or retarding of the development of the forces of production and this implies that social structures will undergo massive transformations over time. Whereas, classical functionalism posits that social institutions are to be functionally explained in terms of their sustaining existing society, historical materialism posits that they are to be functionally explained in terms of their adaptations to the development of the forces of production and that social forms that resist this development are doomed to disappear. Also, this process by which social forms become adapted to the forces of production is not a quiet and easy process. On the contrary, it is often violent and disruptive. Society adjusts itself to nature through the rise to power of new classes. Class struggle plays a crucial role in this adaptive process. Without class struggle the adaptation of social forms to the developing forces of production cannot occur. But as I said before, historical materialism does rely upon functionalist explanations. And in that same book that I referenced above, G. A. Cohen made a persuasive case that historical materialist explanations are functionalist explanations. A few more points: I would contend that functional explanations in the social sciences (and elsewhere) are teleonomic in character. Intentional explanations are thus one species of functional explanations but they are not the only variety. Darwinian biology has shown how we can make sense of functional explanations for biological phenomena without our having to invoke a mysterious creator/designer. Functional explanations do not require intentional agents behind them. I think that what gets people confused when functional explanations are used in the social sciences, is that when we attempt to explain social phenomena in functionalist terms, the fact that people ARE intentional agents leads many people to infer that a functional explanation of a social phenomena requires that there be agents who are consciously aware of the functions in question and who are motivated to act upon them. In some cases, this may well be true but not always. The sociologist Robert Merton (father of the Nobel Prize-winning economist of hedge fund fame) drew a distinction between what he called manifest functions and what he called latent functions ( https://web.archive.org/web/20060721003731/http://www2.pfeiffer.edu/~lridener/courses/MERTONR1.HTML ). The former are functions which people are consciously aware of, and which they are motivated to act upon., whereas the latter are ones that people may not be aware of, but which nevertheless are said to explain the phenomena in question. I do think that historical materialism does require the deployment of functional explanations, and I find it difficult to make sense out of many sorts of Marxian explanations unless they are interpreted as functional explanations. And I hold that Robert Merton’s distinction between latent and manifest functions can be useful for understanding how historical materialist explanations work. Jerry Cohen as I recall in his *Karl Marx’s Theory of History* seemed to have little to say concerning this issue despite what I would contend is its great importance in understanding how functionalist explanations in general work, as well as how Marxist functionalist explanations in particular work. The distinction that Merton draws between latent and manifest functions can be linked to the Marxist distinction between science and ideology. Latent functions operate beyond or behind the conscious awareness of those who are effected by them. Ideological consciousness can comprehend manifest functions but not latent functions, which cannot be perceived and understood without the application of a scientific analysis. For a critique of G. A. Cohen, see Douglas Greene’s article, “ Liberalism with Extra Steps ( https://www.leftvoice.org/liberalism-with-extra-steps/ ).” *Related posts:* Evolutionary Biology and Historical Materialism ( https://medium.com/@jimfarmelant/evolutionary-biology-and-historical-materialism-0038d44d0b2c ) and How can the evolution of social and political institutions be related to Darwinian theory? 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