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Two Qualms about Functionalist Marxism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Joel Dickman
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Abstract

In Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence (1978), G. A. Cohen has developed a distinctively functionalist interpretation of historical materialism. In this paper I outline Cohen's novel reconstruction of Marx and subject it to two independent internal criticisms. I first argue that explanations cannot conform to Cohen's functionalist model. I then suggest that even if there could be explanations having the structure he has proposed, they would fail to be helpful in illuminating the causal kernel of Marx's theory. Finally I sketch a neglected but more promising approach to clarifying historical materialism, due to Geoffrey Hellman.

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Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 57 , Issue 4 , December 1990, pp. 631 - 643
Copyright
Copyright © 1990 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

I'm grateful to Daniel Brudney, Joshua Cohen, Geoffrey Hellman, Jack Knight, Andrew Levine, Ronald McClamrock, Elliott Sober and an anonymous Philosophy of Science referee for valuable remarks on various versions of this paper. And a belated but warm thanks to Alvin Goldman, Jaegwon Kim, Stephen Stich and Lawrence Sklar for being terrific teachers.

References

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