Ideological struggle must target the strongest adversary, not the weakest

Evidence

On the ideological front, however, the defeat of the auxiliaries and the minor hangers-on is of all but negligible importance. Here it is necessary to engage battle with the most eminent of one’s adversaries. Otherwise one confuses newspapers with books, and petty daily polemic with scientific work. The lesser figures must be abandoned to the infinite casebook of newspaper polemic. … A new science proves its efficacy and vitality when it demonstrates that it is capable of confronting the great champions of the tendencies opposed to it and when it either resolves by its own means the vital questions which they have posed or demonstrates, in peremptory fashion, that these questions are false problems. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1541

Categorization

• APHORISMS: A genuine methodological life-rule: on the ideological front one must engage one’s most eminent adversaries, because defeating minor auxiliaries buys nothing real.
• XREF: connects to: Ideological struggle requires engaging elite adversaries, not minor ones, unlike military tactics. — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1541; Refuting an ideology requires attacking its best exponents, not its weakest — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1562; Radical transformation always requires drawing political frontiers against an adversary. — Chantal Mouffe, The Democratic Paradox, 533 (+1 more)