Functionalism Defended

Citation: Kincaid, Harold (1996) Functionalism Defended. In Philosophical foundations of the social sciences: analyzing controversies in social research, Cambridge University Press (RSS)
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Summary

Kincaid believes that functionalism is deeply ingrained in anthropology, and is not likely to disappear from the discipline. As such, we need to be able to describe its utility in regards to explanation. In this article, Kincaid discusses the basics of what functionalism are in the context of anthropology, and provides additional instances in which functional explanations can be used outside of the field. Functionalism is, at its core, explaining a social phenomena in terms of the function that it plays in that society. Because it explains the why of something, Kincaid thinks that all functional explanations are essentially a form of causal explanation.

Although functional explanations are good in principle, they are untenable in practice. We need to be able to demonstrate that functional explanations can be confirmed and tested, and are adequate as a form of scientific explanation. Direct evidence in support of functional explanations would be to test survival by traits and differential sorting, as a way of testing the real function of a phenomena. This has been demonstrated in ecological/environmental studies that use functionalist explanations. Since social phenomena occur in a analog to natural environments, functionalist explanations should work if we abstract it to include social environments.

Kincaid also discusses the idea of optimal traits, which would be powerful evidence for functionalism if they can be shown to be optimal for survival of that trait. Stability arguments, which demonstrate that no other trait could budge the survivability of that trait, would also be good evidence in favor of functionalism explanations.

An example of trait survivability is Hinduisim and cows. Although you could explain the persistence of beef taboos as an optimization of cow for agricultural purposes, Kincaid believes that more evidence is needed in order to create a stronger functionalism argument, in order for that explanation to be considered a form of scientific explanation. Functional explanations are not always the beneficial explanation - things can persist that aren’t beneficial. Kincaid believes that functionalist explanations can exist in combo with causal explanations, because of their high degree of similarity. Functionalism does not exlude other factors or explanations, and like causal explanations, are tendency claims. Any limitations or flaws of functionalism, according to Kincaid, are in the practice, not the principle of the theory/explanatory style. Unlike causal explanations, however, don’t need the precise mechanism to be able to give a good functional explanation.