**4. What is functional analysis and for what?**

To give a short description of the basic premises of functional analysis is to say that the main interest of functional analysis is on the effects or consequences of the phenomena, quite the contrary to causal observations, where attention is on preceding events and factors as explanations and reasons for the existence of a phenomenon under consideration. To count as a functional relation, inference from effects to the existence of a phenomenon requires that two further conditions be fulfilled. Firstly, the consequences, which are of main interest in functional analysis, should not be based on the conscious intentions to bring them about. That is, they should not be the results of goal-directed actions that specifically aim at bringing into being the phenomenon because of its longed for effects, even if social

Contingency Theoretical Functionalism and the Problem of Functional Differentiation 61

prerequisites (see e.g. Parsons, 1964; 1966:5-29), then the theory seems to offer an explanatory 'top-down logic' (Nassehi, 2008a:93) that explains the events in the social world together with the direction of changes irrespective of the intentions and goals of individuals, the actors being thus reduced to 'judgmental doves', as a popular Parson critique in the '60s

It is time to summarize the discussion concerning the basic characteristics and problematic of functional researching. The classical formulation of the basic model of functional explanation as well as the analysis of problematic related to it stems from Carl Hempel. On the assumption that functional analysis aims at giving an explanation to the existence of a phenomenon, Hempel (1965:310; see also Cummins, 1975) has studied whether the functional claims can validly be formulated in the form of a deductive-nomological syllogism. Supposing that we are interested in explaining the occurrence of a trait *i* in a system *s* (at a certain time *t*). Is the following inference valid as an explanation for the

a. At *t*, *s* functions adequately in a setting of kind *c* (characterized by specific internal and

b. *s* functions adequately in a setting kind *c* if a certain necessary condition, *n*, is satisfied.

The answer is a simple and plain no. Even if we leave aside the problems related to the inverse causation, an explanation from effects to the existence of a phenomenon, there abundant problems related to the model. To begin with, the syllogism is not logically valid; claim (d) does not follow from the premises, because some alternative functionally equivalent trait *j* would perfectly well be sufficient to fulfill the condition *n*. And secondly, if the condition (c) is made stricter by claiming that the presence of a trait *i* is functionally indispensable for the satisfaction of *n*, we have a logically valid inference that unfortunately is empirically useless or simply wrong, because the trait *i* almost always has either

Hempel's (1965:318-25; see also Stegmüller, 1983:687-706) critique of functional analysis, especially of the empirical application of the method, may be summarized as concentrating on the following aspects. Talk about the functional requirements or needs of a system, as well as the obligation of noting their possible functional equivalents, presupposes that the criteria delimiting the system, its borders, state, ways of functioning and possible tendencies of change related to these have been defined as precisely as possible. Without this kind of specification of the system in question, including the empirical operationalization of the respective functional concepts, there is the risk of the analysis becoming tautological by inferring functionality from the existence of a phenomenon and explaining its existence thereof. And the menace of deforming the analysis by imposing researcher's own ideals and values as ideals or descriptions of the adequate way of functioning of systems, is always present. In addition, as Hempel states, if satisfying the specification level needed for functional analysis, even in the case of biological systems, is hard to achieve, the problems

c. If trait *i* were present in *s*, then, as an effect, condition *n* would be satisfied.

empirically existent or at least imaginable functionally equivalent substitutes.

multiply when it comes to applying functional analysis to social systems.

**5. From functional explanation to functional analysis** 

declared (Garfinkel, 1987).

existence of an item *i*?

external conditions).

d. Hence, at *t*, trait *i* is present in *s*.

phenomena are in the last instance always based on the actions and interactions of individuals. If the condition is not met, the function in question belongs to the category of manifest functions, to use Robert Merton's (1968:105, 114-18) classic vocabulary. This form of functional analysis causes no problems because the existence of the phenomenon under consideration is ultimately explained by the intentional action of individuals. The question then is a reduction of an explanation to a normal intentional explanation, to a form that Wolfgang Stegmüller (1983:642) calls 'genuine material teleology', on the grounds that the explanation in the last instance is reducible to a common causal explanation, if the reasons or intentions of action are interpreted as motives, as effective causes of actions. Secondly, not every type of accidental phenomenon with its consequences counts as functions, only those with some kind of peculiar hidden goal directness, 'Zweckmässgikeit ohne Zweck': it almost seems as if they have some kind of 'social call' to which they respond by solving some of the existence problems of the social arrangement they become part of. Merton (1968:105) calls these non-intentional but non-accidental phenomena-consequences – relations latent functions, and considers these the most interesting in sociology, because studying them brings knowledge of the 'reasons' of being of different constituents of society and of their veiled relations in social arrangements.

Functional analysis in the form that Merton (1968:106) has given it is rather easy to accept, because he does not think that functional analysis can alone offer a sufficient explanation for the existence of the phenomena under scrutiny. Quite the contrary, he insists on finding the specific social mechanisms which bring about the social institutions satisfying the presumed functional 'needs' attributed to the object of research. In spite of this specification and its merits, Merton's way of doing functional analysis is not without problems. His argumentation in some connections has certain tautological nuances which result from inferring functionality from the existence of a phenomenon, instead of defining the 'needs' of the object independently of phenomena characterized as functional, and thus breaking the tautological circle. Functional analysis becomes problematic when all caution, so characteristic of Merton's analysis, is given up and functional analysis is rather straightforwardly interpreted as explaining the existence of phenomenon by showing how it responds to the existential exigencies of the object under scrutiny and in so doing helps its survival (see, for example, Hempel, 1965:308; Giddens, 1984:295). This ambition of giving an explanation was one of the main reasons for the bad reputation of functional analysis. In the wave of neopositivist critique it was close to becoming extinct as a special approach or as a special methodology of functionalistic tradition, as the title of the one recent book on the subject, *Soziologisher Funktionalismus. Zur Methodologie einer Theorietradition*, edited by Jens Jerkowitz and Carsten Stark (2003), defines it.

The neopositivist critique of functionalism is valid also regarding the main tradition of functionalism in modern sociology, namely Talcott Parsons' theory. Parsons (1949) introduced his theory as an analytical conceptual framework for studying the essential prerequisites of social order, not as an explanatory theory. He was neither very interested in methodological questions and there are very view scattered remarks on functionalism as a method in his writings (see, for example, 1951:29). Parsons' theory, however, is not as far from being an explanatory theory as he thinks. If a social system is defined as a boundary holding system with four basic predefined functional prerequisites, as in Parsons' AGILscheme, and if differentiation is conceptualized as adaptive upgrading, that is, differentiation as structuration of the social system along the lines of functional prerequisites (see e.g. Parsons, 1964; 1966:5-29), then the theory seems to offer an explanatory 'top-down logic' (Nassehi, 2008a:93) that explains the events in the social world together with the direction of changes irrespective of the intentions and goals of individuals, the actors being thus reduced to 'judgmental doves', as a popular Parson critique in the '60s declared (Garfinkel, 1987).
