Red tape (or sometimes paperwork) is a derisive term for excessive regulation or rigid conformity to formal rules that is considered redundant or bureaucratic and hinders or prevents action or decision-making. It is usually applied to government, but can also be applied to other organizations like corporations. The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Bureaucracy is a concept in sociology and political science referring to the way that the administrative execution and enforcement of legal rules are socially organized. ... Corporate redirects here. ...

Red tape generally includes the filling out of unnecessary paperwork, obtaining of unnecessary licenses, having multiple people or committees approve a decision, and various low-level rules that make conducting affairs slower and/or more difficult.

Origins

The origins of the term are obscure, but it alludes to the 17th and 18th century English practice of binding documents and official papers with red tape and were popularized in the writings of Thomas Carlyle protesting against official inertia with expressions like "Little other than a red tape Talking-machine, and unhappy Bag of Parliamentary Eloquence." To this day most barristers' briefs are tied in a pink coloured ribbon known as Red Tape. The most familiar view of Carlyle is as the bearded sage with a penetrating gaze. ... British barristers wearing traditional dress. ... Brief redirects here. ...

Traditionally, Vatican official documents were also bound in red cloth tape.

Another origin tale circulated is that all American Civil War veterans' records were bound in red tape, and the difficulty in accessing them led to the current use of the term, but there is evidence that the term was in use in its modern sense sometime before this.^[1] This article is becoming very long. ...

Although grief over red tape is often seen as a right-wing conviction, Karl Marx wrote about the phenomenon of changing from one person in control of a complete task, to having multiple people each with specialties in specific tasks. He saw this occurring as society shifts from a Seigneurial system to a capitalist system. Although Marx drew different conclusions about this trend, it is often this abstraction among workers that is the source of red tape. This interpretation would explain why it is often perceived that the presence of red tape is increasing. e.g. the Philippine government (Pres. Arroyo Administration) In politics, right-wing, the political right, or simply the right, are terms which refer, with no particular precision, to the segment of the political spectrum in opposition to left-wing politics. ... Karl Heinrich Marx (May 5, 1818, Trier, Germany – March 14, 1883, London) was a German philosopher, political economist, and revolutionary. ... Generic plan of a mediaeval manor; open-field strip farming, some enclosures, triennial crop rotation, demesne and manse, common woodland, pasturage and meadow Manorialism or Seigneurialism is the organization of rural economy and society in medieval western and parts of central Europe, characterised by the vesting of legal and economic... In economics, a capitalist is someone who owns capital, presumably within the economic system of capitalism. ... Abstraction is the process of reducing the information content of a concept, typically in order to retain only information which is relevant for a particular purpose. ...

Red tape reduction

Because of this perception of increasing bureaucracy, the "cutting of red tape" is a popular electoral and policy promise.

Globally, governments have passed legislation and made procedural changes which claim to reduce red tape or reduce administrative burden. In March 2007, the European Council promised to reduce the administrative burden on European Business by 25% by 2012. "We need to slash red tape. As I said very often, what our companies, namely small and medium-sized companies (SMEs), need is not red tape, it's red carpet for their investment," European Commission (EC) President Jose Manuel Barroso told a news conference

A good example is the August 2006 Australian Government's response to the report of its Business Red Tape Taskforce. The report made recommendations across a wide range of sectors, including health and aged care, labour market regulation, consumer regulation, environmental and building regulation, financial, tax and superannuation regulation, and trade. It also made a number of important recommendations to address the underlying causes of over-regulation.

The Australian Government adopted six principles of good regulatory process set out in the report. The principles are:

• establishing a case for action;
• examining alternatives to regulation;
• adopting the option that generates the greatest net benefit to the community;
• providing effective guidance to relevant regulators and affected stakeholders;
• reviewing regularly to ensure the regulation remains relevant and effective; and
• consulting effectively with stakeholders at all stages of the regulatory cycle.

The Australian Government's Office of Regulation Review will be strengthened and reoriented, becoming the Office of Best Practice Regulation.

In Canada, a Federal Parliamentary Committee recommended a Red Tape Reduction Commission. The Ontario Progressive Conservative Party government created a permanent Red Tape Commission that must review all new regulations. The Ontario Progressive Conservative Party (PC Party of Ontario, also known as Tories) is a right-of-centre political party in Ontario, Canada. ...

In the United States, a number of legislatures have pondered or passed Red Tape Reduction Acts including California and Missouri. The New York Governor's Office of Regulation Reform is a good example of US State Government response to concerns about red tape. Official language(s) English Capital Sacramento Largest city Los Angeles Area  Ranked 3rd  - Total 158,302 sq mi (410,000 km²)  - Width 250 miles (400 km)  - Length 770 miles (1,240 km)  - % water 4. ... Official language(s) English Capital Jefferson City Largest city Kansas City Area  Ranked 21st  - Total 69,709 sq mi (180,693 km²)  - Width 240 miles (385 km)  - Length 300 miles (480 km)  - % water 1. ...

The U.S federal government passed the Regulatory Flexibility Act and the Paperwork Reduction Act to address the problem. There are very few or no other articles that link to this one. ...

Some object to government campaigns against red tape seeing them as covert programs of pro-corporate deregulation. Institutions like the British Trade Union Congress and the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives consider red tape as being rules that protect the environment, watch over the worker safety and health, and prevent corruption. Deregulation is the process by which governments remove, reduce, or simplify restrictions on business and individuals in order to (in theory) encourage the efficient operation of markets. ... Trades Union Congress headquarters at Congress House in Great Russell Street near Tottenham Court Road, Camden, London. ... The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives is Canadas leading left-wing think tank. ... The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view. ...

Likewise in CS Lewis's That Hideous Strength, the National Institute for Controlled Experiments engages in a popularist campaign for the reduction of Red Tape. However, they are in fact stripping away the political safeguards that are designed to protect the populace from Fascism. This article is about the C.S. Lewis novel. ... Fascism is an authoritarian political ideology and mass movement that seeks to place the nation, defined in exclusive biological, cultural, and historical terms, above all other loyalties, and to create a mobilized national community. ...

See also

• Bureaucracy

The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Bureaucracy is a concept in sociology and political science referring to the way that the administrative execution and enforcement of legal rules are socially organized. ...

External links

• Australian Taskforce on Reducing the Regulatory Burdens on Business – Rethinking Regulation
• Instruction creep
• Monash Centre for Regulatory Studies
• Not All Regulation Comes Wrapped in Red Tape
• Ontario Red Tape Commission
• 10-Point Plan for Regulatory Reform in Ontario
• Regulatory Affairs Resources
• Unravelling the Red Tape Myths - UK

References

• Barry Bozeman (2000)Bureaucracy and Red Tape Prentice-Hall Publishing.

1. ^ This tale is mentioned and may originate from Episode 9 of the 3rd season of The West Wing

   BARTLET
   You know, after the Civil War, veterans had to come to D.C. to get their pensions? They had to visit the office personally. They waited for a clerk to look through all the Civil War records until their papers were found. You know what their papers were bound with?
   TOBY
   No.
   BARTLET
   Red tape. That's where it comes from. The West Wing may refer to: The West Wing, a television drama set in the West Wing of the White House The West Wing of the White House, the location of the Oval Office and offices for senior members of the Executive Office of the President of the United States...