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Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.

red tape en · NOUN

Pronunciation

Etymology

Alluding to the former practice of binding government documents in red-colored tape. First use appears c. 1658 in the publication Public Intelligencer. See cite below.

Meanings

  1. (uncountable) The binding tape once used for holding important documents together.
    • The use of red tape for tying up papers is of considerable antiquity. An advertisement in the Public Intelligencer, December 6, 1658, offers the reward for a restoration of a 'A little bundle of papers tied with a red tape, were lost on Friday last was a sevennight, between Worcester House and Lincoln's Inn. 1884, Eliezer Edwards, Words, Facts and Phrases ...curious, Quaint and Out-of-the Way Matters, page 469:
    • At twilight in the summer there is never anybody to fear—man, woman, or cat—in the chambers and at that hour the mice come out. They do not eat parchment or foolscap or red tape, but they eat the luncheon crumbs. 1892, Walter Besant, chapter II, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:
  2. (idiomatic, metonymically, uncountable) Time-consuming regulations or bureaucratic procedures.
    • They said we’d be free of all that tedious European red tape and would take back control of our borders, encouraging anyone agitated by immigration to believe that fewer people would come in. […] Post-Brexit red tape is strangling thousands of small businesses, whether travelling musicians or exporters of goods, tying them up in daunting forms or extra charges that cost time and money they don’t have. 2023 June 23, Jonathan Freedland, “With even leavers regretting Brexit, there’s one path back to rejoining the EU”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:
    • I've got to meet you by tomorrow noon / And cut through all this red tape / At a bar called O'Malley's / Where we'll plan our escape 1979, Rupert Holmes, “Escape (The Piña Colada Song)”, in Partners in Crime:
    • That committee does not cut through red tape ; it merely provides better scheduling for different agencies so you do not have sequential review by different agencies , so that you have some kind of simultaneity in the review by different agencies. 1979, United States Senate, Committee on Finance, Crude Oil Tax, U.S. Government Printing Office:
    • caught up in the red tape of officialdom
    • One conspicuous cost of the compromise reached was a promise made by Senator Chuck Schumer to Manchin on what was vaguely called permitting reform: a catchall phrase referring to a whole host of efforts to cut red tape and ease the rollout of energy infrastructure. 2022 October 5, David Wallace-Wells, “Progressives Should Rally Around a Clean Energy Construction Boom”, in The New York Times:
    • All the red tape and paperwork that goes on there prevents any progress.

Deriveds

red-tapist · red-tapism · green tape

Synonyms

paperwork · administrativia · administrivia

Translations (36)

sk úradný šimeľ (excessive bureaucracy) · es burocracia (excessive bureaucracy) · cmn 官僚習氣 /官僚习气 (excessive bureaucracy) · cmn 繁文縟禮 /繁文缛礼 (excessive bureaucracy) · ko 레드 테이프 (excessive bureaucracy) · fr paperasse f paperasserie (excessive bureaucracy) · pl biurokratyzm (excessive bureaucracy) · ko 번문욕례 (excessive bureaucracy) · es formulismos (excessive bureaucracy) · es papelerío (excessive bureaucracy) · ja レッドテープ (excessive bureaucracy) · ja お役所さんの仕事 (excessive bureaucracy) · ru бюрократи́зм (excessive bureaucracy) · es formalismos (excessive bureaucracy) · cmn 繁文縟節 /繁文缛节 (excessive bureaucracy) · es cinta roja (excessive bureaucracy) · pl biurokracja (excessive bureaucracy) · ja 繁文縟礼 (excessive bureaucracy) · es trámites (excessive bureaucracy) · de Amtsschimmel (excessive bureaucracy) · cs úřední šiml (excessive bureaucracy) · af rompslomp (excessive bureaucracy) · pt burocracia (excessive bureaucracy) · hi लालफ़ीता (excessive bureaucracy) · es papeleo (excessive bureaucracy) · ru волоки́та (excessive bureaucracy) · pl biuralizm (excessive bureaucracy) · nl paarse krokodil (excessive bureaucracy) · sv byråkrati (excessive bureaucracy) · fr impôt papier (excessive bureaucracy) · es expedienteo (excessive bureaucracy) · fa کاغذبازی (excessive bureaucracy) · fi paperisota (excessive bureaucracy) · ru канцеля́рщина (excessive bureaucracy) · bg бюрокрация (excessive bureaucracy) · es gestión (excessive bureaucracy)