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Why were early evolutionary theories of culture later criticized by anthropologists such as Franz Boas?

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Fragment of a Roman fresco showing Socrates seated and draped in a white robe, with Greek text above, on a red background with visible cracks. — Philosophical anthropology Socrates, Roman fresco, 1st century bce; in the Ephesus Museum, Selçuk, Turkey.

Early evolutionary theories of culture, which dominated 19th-century anthropology, were heavily criticized by Franz Boas and his followers for several fundamental reasons:

Ethnocentric Bias: Evolutionists arranged cultures on a unilinear hierarchy—typically from "savagery" to "barbarism" to "civilization"—which Boas argued was inherently biased and unscientific. He rejected the notion that there were objective criteria to rank cultures, advocating instead for cultural relativism, the principle that all cultures are equally capable of meeting the needs of their members.123
Racist Assumptions: These theories often conflated race with culture, suggesting that "lower" peoples were biologically incapable of innovation. Boas demonstrated that there is no necessary connection between race and culture, asserting that cultural differences arise from historical and environmental circumstances rather than biological destiny.345
Methodological Flaws: Boas challenged the "comparative method" used by evolutionists, which analyzed cultural traits in isolation to fit them into predetermined stages. He argued that cultures must be studied holistically as the product of unique, historically particular events—an approach known as particularism.23
Complexity of History: Boas’s fieldwork showed that diffusion and local adaptation played significant roles in cultural change, rendering the simple, universal stages proposed by evolutionists untenable.4