Dictionary of Revolutionary Marxism

—   Ta - Td   —

TACHAI PRODUCTION BRIGADE   [DAZHAI in Pinyin]
A rural collective production brigade in the mountainous area of northern Shansi Province which became the pace-setter and model for agricultural work and economic and social development throughout China during the Maoist period.
        In 1975 Tachai had 83 households with about 450 people. Prior to the liberation of China in 1949 Tachai was just one of countless desperately poor villages in China. But after Liberation, and under the excellent leadership of Chen Yonggui [Chen Yung-kuei, old style], the secretary of the Tachai Party branch of the CCP, the whole village (and later the surrounding area) was mobilized to engage in collective work for the benefit of the whole community. Through socialist collective ideology and hard work and perseverance they turned what had been a miserably poor and downtrodden village into a thriving and prosperous community, despite originally having no natural advantages (such as good soil) in the region. A fundamental change in the mental outlook of the people of the brigade took place, and farm production rose rapidly.
        Chairman Mao took note of this great socialist success and in 1964 issued the call to the rest of rural China: “In agriculture, learn from Tachai.” After that the “Learn from Tachai” movement spread rapidly and many Tachai-type brigades and communes soon appeared in various parts of China. In 1970 Hsiyang County, where the Tachai Brigade is located, launched the learn-from-Tachai movement in all its communes and brigades. Grain output that year doubled that of 1967, and Hsiyang County was declared China’s first Tachai-type county. In 1975 the State Council convened a national conference on learning from Tachai, and in 1976 the number of Tachai-type counties grew to 400. And in 1976 China reaped its 15th consecutive rich harvest.
        Chen Yonggui’s socialist spirit and great success at mobilizing the peasant masses led to his gradual elevation to positions of leadership in the local area, then the county and province, and eventually he became a member of the Political Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party and a Vice-Premier of the State Council. He briefly retained these positions after Mao’s death, but then as the capitalist-roaders gained greater power Chen was removed from these positions, and the entire socialist collective economy of rural China was completely dismantled.

TAIPING REBELLION
A massive peasant uprising or civil war that lasted for 14 years, from 1850 to 1864 and was fought in most of the provinces of China. It was led by a semi-Christian millenarian movement known as the Heavenly Kingdom of Peace against the Manchu-led Qing Dynasty. It began when the government officials tried to suppress a Christian sect called the God Worshipping Society which was led by Hong Xiuquan, an unbalanced individual who believed himself to be the younger brother of Jesus Christ. But though it started in reaction to religious persecution by the state, the rebellion grew to enormous size primarily because of the political and economic oppression by the feudal state of the millions of peasant masses in China. (Today, too, we often see that what are nominally religious wars actually are mostly due to the masses’ anger towards oppressive governments and foreign imperialism.) This was the largest war in China since the Qing conquest in 1644, and is one of the bloodiest wars in human history. It was the largest war of the 19th century, and estimates of the deaths that occurred in it range from 20 to 70 million. [Some of the information here comes from the Wikipedia.]
        See also: “EVER-VICTORIOUS ARMY”

“Similarly with the Chinese people’s knowledge of imperialism. The first stage was one of superficial, perceptual knowledge, as shown in the indiscriminate anti-foreign struggles of the Movement of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, the Yi Ho Tuan Movement [Boxer Rebellion], and so on. It was only in the second stage that the Chinese people reached the stage of rational knowledge, saw the internal and external contradictions of imperialism and saw the essential truth that imperialism had allied itself with China’s comprador and feudal classes to oppress and exploit the great masses of the Chinese people. This knowledge began about the time of the May 4th Movement of 1919.” —Mao, “On Practice” (July 1937), SW1:301, online at: https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-1/mswv1_16.htm

“TALKS AT THE YENAN FORUM ON LITERATURE AND ART”
A famous work by Mao Zedong first published in May 1942 and included in volume III of the Selected Works of Mao Tsetung. It is on the Internet in English at several places including http://www.marx2mao.com/Mao/YFLA42.html and http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-3/mswv3_08.htm .
        The Forum on Literature and Art took place during the month of May 1942, and Mao himself gave two presentations, an Introduction on May 2nd, and a longer Concluding speech on May 23rd. Mao stressed the importance of art serving the interests of the masses of people and especially their revolutionary interests. He talked about these key questions in art and literature:
        The problem of class stand, stressing that art should take the standpoint of the proletariat and masses, and that CCP members should promote the political line of the Party in their art work;
        The problem of attitude, that art should criticize the enemy and support the people in their struggles;
        The problem of audience, that our art is for the workers and the masses, rather than for the rich and privileged classes;
        The problem of work, meaning that those engaged in art and literature should merge with the masses, get to know their needs and situation, and learn from the masses how to reach the masses with their art; and
        The problem of study, that artists and writers must study Marxism-Leninism so that their work will be richer in content and more correct in orientation.
        The “Talks...” were especially strong with regard to the need for artists and writers to share the life of the masses so that they will be better able to reflect the real situation in society. And this work even includes one of Mao’s earliest statements of the basic idea of the mass line: “Revolutionary statesmen, the political specialists who know the science or art of revolutionary politics, are simply the leaders of millions upon millions of statesmen—the masses. Their task is to collect the opinions of these mass statesmen, sift and refine them, and return them to the masses, who then take them and put them into practice.”
        For a further discussion of this important work, and its context, see: “For Your Reference: About ‘Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art’”, Peking Review, vol. 15, #20, May 19, 1972, available at: https://www.massline.org/PekingReview/PR1972/PR1972-20b.htm

TANGIBLE PROPERTY
Assets which can be touched or felt, including homes, stores, factories, machinery, raw materials purchased, vehicles, livestock, etc., as opposed to intangible property such as stocks, bonds, savings accounts, cash, accounts receivable, intellectual property, and so forth.
        In capitalist societies tangible property is taxed, often heavily so, while intangible property is normally not taxed at all. Thus there are property taxes on homes, but no property taxes on stocks and bonds owned. Why is this, do you suppose? The rich man owns a lot more tangible property than does a poor man, of course. But a much higher proportion of the wealth of the rich man is in the form of intangible property, in stocks, bonds, bank accounts, and so forth. That is why those things are not taxed! The bourgeoisie runs society in its own class interests, after all! (It is true that there are taxes on income from both tangible and intangible property, but not on the intangible property itself. And even with regard to income taxes, the tax code is loaded with a vast number of loopholes for the rich.)

TANKIE
        1. A strong supporter of Soviet-style social-imperialism (or sometimes more traditional and openly bourgeois forms of imperialism), who defends the use of tanks and/or other powerful weapons in the pursuit of imperialist interests.
        The term came about when the state-capitalist and social-imperialist Soviet Union began using tanks in the 1950s to put down revolts in its satellite countries, especially Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968. In Britain, and elsewhere, the defenders of the Soviet Union and its outrageous actions were then referred to as “tankies” because they supported the use of tanks to suppress the people’s revolts. In the 1980s the term was used to refer to those who supported the Soviet Union in its attempt to put down the revolt against its puppet regime in Afghanistan. More recently it has been frequently used to refer to those who support the efforts of Russia (no longer pretending to be a socialist country) to prop up its client regime in Syria against rebellions and attacks of all kinds. In this situation a secondary meaning of ‘tankie’ seems to be coming about: Someone who, from a nominally “left” perspective, supports some vicious authoritarian regime, on the absurd grounds that this regime is at least somewhat opposed to United States imperialism. In other words, ‘tankie’ now sometimes just means a revisionist.
        2. [As used by Trotskyists and some other fanatical opponents of Stalin:] Because of the often dominant voice of academic Marxists and Trotskyists on the “left” in the U.S. today, definition 1 of the word ‘tankie’ (given above) is often twisted, distorted and identified with what they call “Stalinism”. Although there were certainly some serious problems and shortcomings in the Soviet Union when Stalin was alive, it was still a socialist country then and not a state-capitalist or social-imperialist country. And the term ‘tankie’ properly speaking refers to actions by social-imperialists or other phony “leftists”. But since this “Trot” definition is so common now, people who use the word ‘tankie’ today should always try to make clear exactly what they mean by it!

“The first time ‘Tankie’ was written down was in the Guardian [U.K.] in May 1985, in an article describing the Morning Star [CPGB] crowd: ‘The minority who are grouped around the Morning Star (and are variously referred to as traditionalists, hardliners, fundamentalists, Stalinists, or “tankies”—this last a reference to the uncritical support that some of them gave to the Soviet ‘intervention’ in Afghanistan).’”

TAOISM   [DAOISM]
[To be added...]
        See also: LAO ZI

“The error of observing and studying matter separate from motion resides in overstating the importance of the factors of immobility or equilibrium, in concealing their limitations and substituting these partial factors for the whole, in generalizing a particular condition of motion, and in presenting them in absolute terms. The saying beloved of China’s ancient metaphysical thinkers, ‘Heaven changeth not, neither does the Dao’ [saying of Dong Zhongshu (179-104 BCE)] is indicative of this theory of a static universe; and although these thinkers recognized change in the phenomena of the universe and society, they refused to recognize it as change in their essence. From their perspective, the essence of the universe and society remained eternally unchangeable. And the principal reason that they thought like this was the limitations of their class; for if the feudal landlord class admitted that the essence of the universe and society is in motion and develops, then theoretically this was tantamount to signaling the death sentence of their own class. The philosophy of all reactionary forces is the theory of immobility. The revolutionary classes and masses have perceived the principle of the development of the world, and therefore advocate the transformation of society and the world—and their philosophy is dialectical materialism.” —Mao, “Lecture Notes on Dialectical Materialism” (1937), in Nick Knight, ed., Mao Zedong on Dialectical Materialism (1990), pp. 106-7.

TARGET RATE (Federal Reserve)
See: FEDERAL FUNDS RATE

TARGETED KILLING
A term referring to what has become the central strategy of U.S. imperialism in its so-called “War on Terror”. One of the specific methods utilized is the assassination of individuals, as was done by a U.S. Navy Seal team in the case of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in May 2011. However, much more common and typical is the use of drones to remotely kill supposed “terrorist suspects” and, inevitably because of very frequent “accidents”, much larger numbers of innocent civilians including a great many children. Because of this, the strategy of “targeted killing” is constantly generating many more new enemies of U.S. imperialism than it is killing. It is therefore doomed to fail in the end.
        Targeted killings (assassinations) have been part of the arsenal of U.S. imperialism since it came into existence well over a century ago. But until recently assassinations were more of an adjunct to “gunboat diplomacy”, invasions, and more conventional strategies of war. The “War on Terror” itself also began with the more conventional bombings and invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. But U.S. imperialism and its allies became bogged down in those wars, and found them way too costly. So, as is so often the case, the U.S. looked for a cheaper technical solution to what was actually a social problem of their own making. This new strategy of assassinations by drones first became important during the second term of George W. Bush. But during the Obama administration it has really mushroomed and become the basic strategy for its entire “War on Terror”. Because of all the civilians being murdered, this “targeted killing” strategy is gradually turning that war ever more clearly into a war of U.S. imperialism against the people of the world.
        See also the New York Times article, “Targeted Killing Comes to Define War on Terror” (April 7, 2013).

TARGETS OF THE REVOLUTION
See: REVOLUTION—Targets Of

TARP [Troubled Asset Relief Program]
An emergency U.S. government bailout program for banks and other financial institutions which was passed in the fall of 2008 with an initial appropriation of 700 billion dollars. The name comes from the original idea that the money would be used primarily to buy up the “toxic assets” of the banks and Wall Street firms, such as their foolish investments in subprime mortgages and securities based on them. (The government bill used the euphemism “troubled assets” rather than the actual term being used by the public and Wall Street brokers themselves—“toxic assets”.) Actually, however, the government quickly changed its idea about what to do with all this money, and started using it to “recapitalize” these banks and other corporations. The aim was still to prop up these supposedly “private” corporations and keep them from going bankrupt, but the method was switched to simply giving them the money (in exchange for grossly overvalued stock certificates) instead of directly buying up their bad investments. This was a hidden form of bourgeois nationalization, in which the government “invested” in these financial institutions but did little to control or direct them, let alone to do so in the interests of the people.

[Bloomberg Businessweek:] “You report that after Treasury [Dept.] infused capital into banks, most recipients decreased their small business lending rather than increasing it. Why?”
        [Elizabeth Warren, the Congressional TARP watchdog:] “Wall Street banks cut back small business lending by 9 percent, more than double their 4 percent cutback in overall lending. Small business lending is expensive. It falls between consumer lending, which is driven almost entirely by numbers like credit scores or Zip Codes and pays off in volume, and large business lending, which is very much about relationships but pays off in very large fees per transaction. Small business lending has proportionally more expense associated with each loan.”
         —John Tozzi, “Speed Dial: Making Banks Lend”, Bloomberg Businessweek June 28 - July 4, 2010. Warren says that the basic TARP pattern was to “put [government] money into banks, who will then lend it”. However, this is not necessarily what the banks actually did with all that government money. —Ed.]

TASCA, Angelo   (1892-1960)
Italian syndicalist in Turin in his early years. Worked with Gramsci, Togliatti and Terracini, and after the Livorno Congress in 1921 joined the Italian Communist Party. He was a rightist who broke with the left wing of the party around 1926, and was expelled in 1929 (because of his support of Bukharin against Stalin it is said). He emigrated to France and became a French citizen in 1936. During the Spanish Civil War he supported the Trotskyite POUM in opposition to the Communist Party of Spain. During World War II Tasca was an important official in the Vichy regime in France (which collaborated with Nazi Germany). After World War II he became a professional anti-Communist and “fiery anti-Stalinist”.

“After the trial of Bukharin, Tasca abandoned Marxism altogether and swerved to the right. The outbreak of war found him broadcasting for French radio. In 1940, he rejected an opportunity to escape to London and worked for the Vichy government as an anti-Communist propagandist. He did so because he was convinced that the enmity between Communists and Socialists had brought France to defeat. However, his hope that France could be reborn under Vichy was short-lived and he soon made contact with the Belgian resistance. It was not enough and his early collaborationism prevented his having any kind of political career in France or Italy after 1945. With some bitterness, he turned to writing fierce anti-Communist studies based on his own archives and diaries. He ended up on the CIA-funded lecture circuit....” —Paul Preston, quoted in a Stanford University sponsored anti-communist website discussion at: http://web.stanford.edu/group/wais/Fascism/fascism_angelo.htm

TASKS AND SKILLS
See: MATCHING SKILLS AND TASKS

TAX LAWYERS
Lawyers employed to allow corporations and the rich to make best use of the thousands of pages describing special LOOPHOLES (see below) in the tax laws in capitalist countries.
        See also: CORPORATE TAXES,   INVERSION

“How does General Electric get away with paying little to no federal taxes? By employing a tax department of some 975 lawyers and accountants, often called the world’s best tax law firm. Headed by John Samuels, a bow-tie-wearing former Treasury Department official, the tax department has more than tripled in size over the past two decades, all in the interest of reducing the company’s tax bill. The department is widely admired for its artful accounting, crafted by the dozens of former IRS officials and former employees of congressional tax-writing committees that GE has hired. ... GE also files tax returns in 250 global jurisdictions, many of them low-tax countries where profits are parked to avoid the U.S. taxman.” —The Week, Sept. 2, 2011, p. 13.

TAX LOOPHOLES
Loopholes are special exceptions in the tax code which allows those who qualify (virtually always corporations and special categories of rich people) to escape paying part of their taxes. Politicians are bribed (usually in the form of “campaign donations”) by the rich to include the loopholes which will benefit those bribing them. The fact that the tax code is now so enormously complex and full of tens of thousands of loopholes speaks for itself as to who is in control of the American government.
        See also: CORPORATE TAXES,   INVERSION

“The federal tax code, which was 400 pages long in 1913, has swollen to about 70,000. Americans now spend 7.6 billion hours a year grappling with an incomprehensible tangle of deductions, loopholes, and arcane reporting requirements. That is the equivalent of 3.8 million skilled workers toiling full-time, year-round, just to handle the paperwork. By this measure, the tax-compliance industry is six times larger than car-making....
         “Every wrinkle in the tax code represents a favor to some group.... A typical loophole has passionate defenders but no opponents. Those who benefit from it, benefit a lot. Those who would gain from its repeal (i.e., taxpayers in general), have never heard of it. So the mess gets ever messier. Happy April 15th.” —The Economist, April 10, 2010, p. 35.

TAX ON WEALTH
See: WEALTH TAX

TAYLORISM
[To be added...]
        See also: TIME AND MOTION STUDIES

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