RAND, Ayn (1905-1982)
A quintessential bourgeois philosopher and novelist who actually sought to construct a
philosophy (which she called “Objectivism”) based on the open glorification of capitalism
and selfishness!
See also:
Philosophical doggerel about her.
RATIONALISM
[To be added... ]
REAL INTEREST RATE
The nominal interest rate minus the current inflation rate. Thus the real interest rate
indicates the actual gain in purchasing power for the lender and the loss in purchasing
power for the borrower. For example if a bank loan is at a nominal 10% and the inflation
rate is 7%, then the real interest rate is only 3%. It is also possible for real interest
rates to be negative if the rate of inflation exceeds the nominal interest rate.
RECESSION (Economics)
Modern name (in the imperialist era since World War II) for the lowest part of the common
capitalist economic cycle, in which many—but not
all!—of the basic economic contradictions inherent in the capitalist mode of production
come to a head. If all these contradictions, including the most fundamental of them,
the contradiction between social production and private appropriation, fully come to a head,
then we have a much more serious situation, a depression,
rather than merely a recession.
Bourgeois economists define a “recession”
in a different and much more complex way, but basically as a period when the economy
overall is shrinking rather than growing. By that standard there have been 25 recessions
in the U.S. since 1896, including two during the Great
Depression of the 1930s, and one continuing at present (which is said to have started
in December 2007) when we are actually almost certainly in the beginning stages of the
development of a new depression.
REFLATION
Purposeful inflation (additional expansion of the currency
supply) in order to stop deflation or even to prevent stable
prices! (Most contemporary bourgeois economists believe that “mild inflation” is best for
the economy!) “Reflation”, in other words, is—in the mouths of bourgeois economists—pretty
much just a euphemism for inflation!
REFORMISM
[To be added...]
RELATIONS OF PRODUCTION
[To be added...]
RENMIN RIBAO
The Chinese name of the People’s Daily newspaper,
published by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. (With tones indicated:
Rénmín Rìbào.)
RENT
The income periodically received from allowing others the right to use capital, land or
other property, which does not involve any participation in business activity on the
part of those receiving the rent.
See also:
DIFFERENTIAL RENT.
RETRODICTION
1. The determination of the timing and circumstances of something that has already happened,
such as by calculating that there was a solar eclipse in what is now southern France at a
certain date 10,000 years ago (despite the absence of any historical records to that
effect).
2. The “prediction” of something that has already occurred on the basis of information
that was available before the event occurred. Retrodiction in this sense is a highly dubious
form of scientific procedure since it is all too easy to selectively adduce just those facts
which might seem to lead to the already known result and to ignore all the evidence which
might have ruled out any prediction based on just those facts. Consequently it is all too
easy to convince yourself that you understand the reasons why some event occurred based on a
completely erroneous theory. This is why it is much more impressive to predict any sort of
phenomenon, including social events such as depressions or revolutions, before they
occur than it is to come up with some theory about why they happened after they occur.
Actual predictions should be treated much more seriously in science than
retrodictions, and are by far the better test of theories!
REVISIONISM
[Marxist senses:] 1. The invalid (unscientific) modification of a correct principle of
the science of revolution (Scientific Marxism, also known as Marxism-Leninism-Maoism). The
term ‘revisionism’, however, is rather unfortunate since of course every scientific
theory must be scientifically revised from time to time in those aspects which are
proven to be incorrect. But in politics there are many who choose to revise well-supported
theories and throw out principles which are certainly correct simply because their own class
perspective cannot accept them as they stand.
2. Parties and trends which characteristically indulge in revisionism in the first sense.
REVOLUTION, SOCIAL
The replacement of one socioeconomic formation
with another, higher one. This implies the replacement of one class as the ruler of society
by another (except in the change from primitive
communal society to slave society, where there was
originally no ruling class; and in the change from socialism to
communism, where the proletariat gradually ceases to exist as a
class.)
Whereas bourgeoisie commentators often use
the term “revolution” very loosely to mean any change of government except through established
electoral procedures (and sometimes even including that!), Marxists reserve the term
for genuine changes in the form of society, and moreover changes which are progressive and in
the interests of the people (as opposed to
counter-revolution).
“Marxism-Leninism consistently holds that the fundamental question in all revolutions is that of state power.” —A Proposal Concerning the General Line of the International Communist Movement: The letter of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China in reply to the letter of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union of March 30, 1963 (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1963), p. 21.
REVOLUTIONARY COMMUNIST PARTY, U.S.A.
A very small, nominally “Maoist”, revolutionary Party in the U.S., founded in October 1975
primarily from its predecessor organization, the Revolutionary Union. Its
chairman and primary leader since its inception has been Bob
Avakian, around whom an absurd personality cult has
been erected and recently further intensified.
While once a very promising revolutionary
organization, the RCP today has degenerated into a tiny doctrinaire and sectarian
cult with no prospects of ever leading a revolution in the U.S.,
nor even any longer of being any sort of serious political force on the left.
REVOLUTIONARY INTERNATIONALIST MOVEMENT
An international association of Maoist revolutionary parties. [More to be added.]
REVOLUTIONARY UNION
A U.S. revolutionary organization (not a labor union!) formed originally as the “Bay Area
Revolutionary Union” in 1968 in the San Francisco Bay Area, which later spread around the
country and transformed itself into the Revolutionary Communist Party in
1975.
RICARDO, David (1772-1823)
English economist. Overall, his work reached the highest level of classical bourgeois
political economy.
RIGHT (Adj.)
[To be added...]
“RIGHTS”
[To be added...]
See also:
BOURGEOIS RIGHT,
“NATURAL RIGHTS”
ROBINSON, Joan (1903-1983)
A leading bourgeois economist during the middle part of the 20th century.
Taught at Cambridge University for 40 years. She was an associate and extender of
Keynes, and was also somewhat influenced by Marx and later by Maoist political economy.
Her book Essay on Marxian Economics (1942) brings out her rejection of the
labor theory of value.
See also:
BASTARD KEYNESIANISM.
RODBERTUS, Johann (1805-1875)
Prussian landowner, economist, and theoretician of Prussian Junker “state socialism”.
ROUSSEAU, Jean-Jacques (1712-1778)
French philosopher, and democrat, who was one of the great figures of the
Enlightenment. He was an ideologist of the
Petty Bourgeoisie.
See also:
GENERAL WILL,
SOCIAL CONTRACT and
philosophical doggerel
about Rousseau.
RUSSELL, Bertrand (1872-1970)
One of the best known bourgeois philosophers of the 20th century, and one of
the most overrated. He was constantly changing his mind about almost every topic, philosophical
and political, so it is hard to summarize his “ideas”. For example, at one time he advocated
an unprovoked nuclear attack on the Soviet Union, and a few years later championed the
“better red than dead” anti-nuclear movement. For more about his philosophical flightiness,
see the philosophical doggerel
page on him.
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