Functional socialism

FUNCTION Al

Viewed in this light, it takes precedence over any individual. A.B. cannot stand aside and say: ‘“This does not suit me; I'll do it differently”. He will find himself under the force majeure of something vastly greater than himself.

We are here confronted with what de Meztu calls “the primacy of things’. At the first glance, this seems a harsh doctrine. But, if we reflect, we instantly remember that all—or nearly all—our loyalties are to things and not to persons. The Christian is loyal to his church, which is a thing, the loyalist to the throne, which is a thing, the politician to his doctrines, which are abstract things, the worker to his trade union, which is a thing, even the footballer, the cricketer, the tennis player are loyal to their clubs, which are things, or to their games, which also are things. If then we see in function a saving principle, an activity to gain our ends, why deny our loyalty? In reality, of course, the principle wins our intellectual assent, whilst our loyalty goes to the groups or associations whose raison d’étre derives from the function.

To the question whether this is some new principle, the answer is that it is as old as organized religion and certainly as old as the medizyval guilds. From the beginning, the priest has declared his loyalty to the Church, whose function was to save or cure souls. The power of salvation rested upon the inspiration, the authority or sanction of the Church: the priest was the functionary who served the function. At whatever cost—death, exile, torture, im-