Transformism operates by absorbing individuals first, then entire opposition groups

Evidence

Two periods of transformism: 1. from 1860 to 1900 ‘molecular’ transformism, i.e. individual political figures formed by the democratic opposition parties are incorporated individually into the conservative-moderate ‘political class’ (characterised by its aversion to any intervention of the popular masses in state life, to any organic reform which would substitute a ‘hegemony’ for the crude, dictatorial ‘dominance’); 2. from 1900 onwards transformism of entire groups of leftists who pass over to the moderate camp (the first event is the formation of the nationalist party, with ex syndicalist and anarchist groups, which culminates in the Libyan war in the first instance and subsequently in interventionism). — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1874

Categorization

• DEFINE: Names the two distinct mechanisms/moments of trasformismo — molecular absorption of individuals versus wholesale defection of groups.
• XREF: The contrast between hegemony and crude dominance is foundational for the toolkit the reader is assembling, and the absorption-of-opposition mechanism carries directly into analysis of how liberal states co-opt minority and dissident voices. — connects to: Democracy exists where led groups can pass into the leading group — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 1869
• DEEPTHINKING: The distinction between hegemony (consent-based rule) and dominance (crude dictatorial control), plus the claim that the conservative political class was defined by aversion to organic reform actually substituting hegemony for dominance, is a dense, load-bearing passage for understanding how ruling classes prefer to rule without giving ground.