I have been thinking hard on this issue for a while now and I've laid out an alternative way to conceptualize the struggle for legitimacy. I am trying hard to think as originally as possible so not every idea is going to be a good one but at least there is room for discussion.

Essentially, we are talking about fighting ideas - we are trying to bring about changes to peoples thinking to get them to act in ways we desire. In that case the battlefield is the mind of our adversary and this is where we make the conceptual leap. On this battlefield, we are the weak fighting the strong. If that is the case, we should employ classical insurgent philosophies where the currency is probably legitimacy rather than the classical measures of territory in the physical domain.

Using Maoist philosophy for a physical campaign:
"In China, the Maoist Theory of People's War divides warfare into three phases. In Phase One, the guerrillas earn the population's support by distributing propaganda and attacking the organs of government. In the Phase Two, escalating attacks are launched against the government's military forces and vital institutions. In Phase Three, conventional warfare and fighting are used to seize cities, overthrow the government, and assume control of the country." [Yes, it’s from Wikipedia but it will do]

Imagine instead a domain or battlefield occupied only by ideas with the government of those ideas being legitimacy becasue legitimacy sets the framework in which all other ideas operate. In the first phases, you erode the legitimacy of the opposition by attacking certain ideas that can be easily defeated. In the second phase, you develop your own legitimacy as an alternative to those of the opposition. In the last phase, your legitimacy enters into primacy and becomes the primary referent or government of the other ideas on the battlefield.

Obviously this is all linked to acting in the physical realm.

I throw this up as an alternative model mainly to get ideas so please let me know what you think.

JD