What is the main conflict in The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa?

The novel's personal stories of transformation play out within the context of a powerful period of real-life, socio-political transformation in Italy in general, and in Sicily in particular. An examination of the historical specifics and manifestations of this transformation are perhaps best suited to another document, the focus here being on the relationship between big-T (national) transformation and small-t (personal) transformation as portrayed in the particular context of that book. That relationship is manifest in the parallels between the movement of the country from a restricted sociopolitical identity and the movement of an individual (the Prince, Angelica, Concetta) from a restricted psycho-emotional identity. Both levels of transformation emerge through conflict - in the case of the former, armed conflict between the forces of change and the forces of conservativeism; in the case of the latter, inner conflict between those same forces as manifest not in guns but in doubts and certainties. It's important to note, however, that the larger conflict (between aristocracy and capitalism) does play out on a personal level - in the conflict between the lazily conservative Prince and the busily ambitious Calogero.