Functional explanation and evolutionary social science

Abstract

From their conception to the present, the social sciences have invoked a kind of explanation that looks suspicious by the standards of the natural sciences. They explain why social practices exist by reference to the purpose or needs they serve. This chapter traces the controversies over the explanations—generally called functional explanations—and argues that they are widespread in some of the best current social science and that they can provide compelling information in some cases, despite the many doubts about them. It surveys the general usage of functional explanations from classic sociologists to the present and common doubts about them. It also surveys past accounts of the working of functional explanations and their problems, and develops two distinct models of functional explanation: selectionist explanations, which show how a practice exists in order to bring about its effects; and functional role analysis, which explain systems in terms of component parts. Further, the chapter discusses specific instances of functional explanation as well as some general mechanisms thought to underlie them. A long-standing dispute in and about the social sciences is the extent to which large scale social phenomena can be explained in individualist terms. Variants of functional explanation might seem to support the individualist side of this dispute by explaining social phenomena entirely in terms of effects that exist in order to promote various individual traits.