Articulation theory risks formalism that weakens historicity by treating elements as invariant.

Evidence

The framework is also open to the criticism that it leaves the internal elements of any “structural combination” unchanged with change or transition being limited to the variations (different articulations) through which the “invariant elements” are combined. This weakens the historicity of the approach—contravening what we have called the historical premise of Marx’s work. … This notion of the variation between invariant elements has resulted in a formalist way of defining a “mode of production” (following, especially, Balibar): so that some of the real advances made in attempting to ground analysis in a more developed and sophisticated understanding of modes of production and their combination can easily be vitiated by a sort of formalist hunt for one, separate, “mode of production” after another. — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 620

Categorization

• QUESTION: The formalist critique — invariant elements recombined — resonates with current debates on structuralist vs historical approaches; worth chasing how Hall resolves it elsewhere.