Sorry about that, should have provided more context.
Roughly, “intentionalists” believe that the Holocaust was part of a Nazi “master plan,” in place from an early date. In this version of the events, the Nazi leadership had long wished to physically exterminate the Jews, and when they got their chance they ruthlessly carried out their plan.
“Functionalists” believe that no such “master plan” existed, that the Nazis lacked a clear idea about how to solve “the Jewish problem,” and that the Holocaust was instead the result of the cruel inner workings of the Nazi state. In this version of the events, a flurry of proposed “solutions”, including expulsion and ghettoization, were cynically bandied about over the years in all levels of the Nazi state, until at a fairly late date “cumulative radicalization” led to the idea of physical extermination, and hence the tragedy of the Holocaust.
“Intentionalists” tend to depict Hitler as an ideologically driven mastermind, and stress the extremely well-organized, disciplined, “all-orders-from-the-top”-type aspects of the Nazi state.
“Functionalists” tend to depict Hitler as more of a shrewd opportunist (though equally evil, I should add), and stress the messy, chaotic aspects of the Nazi state, fraught with infighting and conflicting individual initiatives from all manner of mid-level bureaucrats.
This discussion was very big in Germany back in the day, and bitterly divided the historians there: They duked it out in all the major newspapers, in heated TV debates, etc., etc. – it was a big, big deal, and of course it soon got very personal, too. It wasn’t long before both British and American historians weighed in, as well – and in any case I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re all still going at it.
I read up on all of this a couple of years back, though (I’ll admit) somewhat superficially, and without ever really forming a definitive opinion either way.
Others Dopers might have, though – hence my original query.