The phrase "operative concept" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to describe a key or essential idea or principle that is crucial in understanding or carrying out a particular task or concept. Example: In order to successfully solve this mathematical problem, the operative concept is understanding the order of operations.
As an anthropologist might tell you, the operative concept here was economy.
To be sure, the GOP is struggling with both identity and popularity at the moment, but the operative concept in Gingrich's formulation isn't either party but "today".
And, perhaps most fascinating of all, increased scientific literacy only increased the cultural divide.David Roberts captures the upshot of all this.The operative concept here is "motivated reasoning".
The first is the extent to which "heads-I-win-tails-you-lose" remains the operative concept for Wall Street compensation.
Due to high possibility of the pin tract infection, the operative concept of open reduction and internal fixation was precluded (Figs. 1, 2).
The airline was criticized for not having standardized an operative concept that the crew fully respected and followed.
Although these urban kibbutzim are not hotels, they do indicate a trend in taking the co-operative concept out of the country and into the city.
In order to make operative the concept of disability, we apply the following somewhat strict definition: a person is considered to be disabled if he or she reports having been strongly limited in his or her activities during at least the past six months.
How best to make operative the concept of frailty is disputed, but as detailed later, both well-established methods (that is, the frailty syndrome/phenotype and a frailty index (FI) based on the accumulation of health deficits) have been linked to late-life cognitive impairment.
The new co-operative blended learning concept is being developed under leadership of the TU Dresden team with collaborative partners in S axony.
Others motivated by post-modern considerations concerning the nature of the self, rationality, language, and identity, are also suspicious of the manner in which the basic concepts operative in liberal theories of justice ("autonomy" for example) are understood as fixed, transparent, and without their own political presuppositions (see, e.g., Butler 1990; for general discussion see White 1990).
