Capitalist modernization proceeds by passive revolution when revolutionary forces are defeated

Evidence

An essential, though unspoken, premiss of Americanism and Fordism is that the revolutionary working-class movement was in a phase of retrenchment and defeat throughout the capitalist world. In the absence of an antagonistic revolutionary force any changes taking place within the mode of production could at most constitute what Gramsci, here and elsewhere in the Quaderni , terms a “passive revolution”. Changes would take place, leading to the suppression of certain contradictions. But new contradictions would appear in their place. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1029

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the key Gramscian concept of ‘passive revolution’ — change that suppresses some contradictions while generating new ones, in the absence of an antagonistic revolutionary force.
• XREF: Core vocabulary for the Islamophobia toolkit — connects to how ideologies and structures absorb/deflect opposition rather than being overthrown. Also connects to the heavy prose of this book.