Co-option

Co-option, also known as co-optation and sometimes spelt cooption or cooptation, is a term with three common meanings. It may refer to:

1) The process of adding members to an elite group at the discretion of members of the body, usually to manage opposition and so maintain the stability of the group. Outsiders are "co-opted" by being given a degree of power on the grounds of their elite status, specialist knowledge, or potential ability to threaten essential commitments or goals ("formal co-optation"). Co-optation may take place in many other contexts, such as a technique by a dictatorship to control opposition.

2) The process by which a group subsumes or acculturates a smaller or weaker group with related interests, or the process by which one group gains converts from another group by replicating some aspects of it without adopting the full program or ideal ("informal co-optation"). Co-optation is associated with the cultural tactic of recuperation, and is often understood to be synonymous with it.

3) A procedural mechanism where existing members of a legislative body, corporate board, or the like invite or elect additional members to join them, such as in British local government until 1972. This may be the mechanism by which one of the first two process occur.