Positivism and 'Functional Theory' in the Thought of Karl Polanyi, 1907-1922

Karl Polanyi is the author of a modern social science classic, The Great Transformation, as well as a number of well-known and widely debated essays collected in Trade and Market in the Early Empires and Primitive, Archaic and Modern Economies. These texts were researched and written either during his second exile in 1930s Britain or in wartime or post-war North America. Not so well known, however, are his Hungarian writings from the 1910s. Until recently, very few of these had been republished or translated, although this is in the process of being rectified [: Karl Polanyi: The Hungarian Writings]. With reference to new translations of his Hungarian writings, to interviews with his daughter, Kari Polanyi-Levitt, as well as to biographical essays by György Litván, Évá Gábor, Endre Kiss, and Zoltán Horváth, this article explores his early influences, drawing attention in particular to his flirtation with and then violent reaction against philosophical materialism and 'objectivist' sociology, his appreciation of Ernst Mach's positivism, and his adherence to the 'functional theory' of contemporary Guild Socialism.