See the "Introduction" in Igor Mel'chuk and Alexandr Zholkovsky, Explanatory Combinatorial Dictionary of Modern Russian, Wiener Slawistischer Almanach, Sonderband 14, Vienna, 1984.
For a pegagogical application of the notion, see Richard L. Leed and Alexander D. Nakhimovsky, "Lexical Functions and Language Learning," Slavic and East European Journal, vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 104-113 (1979).