RLP,

Fortunately for me I have the education to earn enough not to depend on the handouts that Labor uses to buy votes from feeble minded voters

Shadow Minister: As a left social democrat (or liberal democratic socialist) I support liberal rights, civil liberties, and social rights equally. I don't see this as being in conflict with my identification with PARTS of the Marxist tradition.

Human beings are not merely animals. They need more than somewhere to shelter and be well-fed.

But capitalism also tries to compartmentalise people narrowly. For example - efforts to narrow the scope of education to the demands of the labour market.

Human dignity and development also demands inclusion when it comes to culture, education and so on.

Tristan,

The conundrum for you must be then that if western capitalism delivers far more completely on human rights and your so called social rights than any version of marxism so far, then surely marxism is an abject failure.

Shadow Minister;

Western liberal democracy 'delivered' for several reasons:

a) It was under pressure from the Communist Bloc which made the elites of Western nations more likely to compromise on social rights, while upholding liberal rights - partly to legitimise as against the Eastern bloc. Those rights (liberal and social rights) are now under attack.

b) Post-WWII it was clear that there were benefits to strategic planning, and that the state sector had potential. This was also in the wake of the Great Depression which discredited traditional Economic Liberalism. The post-WWII 'consensus' included many socialist/social democrat elements. eg: the NHS in Britain. The German Christian Democrats were strong supporters of the resulting compromise of welfare state and mixed economy.

c) In both the West and the East there were 'core' and 'peripheral' national economies in competing world systems. (it happened to a lesser extent in the East ; but Romania was a social and environmental disaster because of the massive concentration of heavy industry) Neither East nor West delivered justice ; Though in the West superior material living standards were delivered through exploitation of the 'periphery'.

d) If you look the Western 'spheres of interest' you will see that Western imperialism was a reality ; and human rights were not so widely delivered in Central and South America , Indonesia, for a long time in Taiwan and South Korea ; and so on.

The question is: Where Western nations 'delivered' was it capitalism that did it? Or was it social democracy?

And if you personally, really truly believe in human liberties - and are a Liberal or Conservative - you could do worse than to work through LNP to get rid of the double standards on civil liberties and human rights that we see so often.

Also remember the Social Democrats were amongst the first to fight for free, universal and equal suffrage in Europe and elsewhere. Modern liberal democracy is in many ways a social democratic achievement. And social democracy began in Marxism ; and was strongly influenced by Marxism in the post-WWI environment - where much of Europe embraced liberal democracy under intense pressure from Communism.

Tristan,

I think we can both agree now that Marxism delivers neither human rights nor social benefits in any way close to what western capitalist based societies do.

As for the debate as to whether capitalism or social democracy delivered social benefits, the short answer is that while
Social democrats played a significant part, none of the social benefits would have been possible without the powerful economic engines of capitalism.

As for your points:

a) Considering the tyranny, poverty and misery in the communist bloc I find your suggestion of "pressure" from the communist bloc hard to swallow.

b) I don't see what strategic planning has to do with social "rights"

c) Romania was communist as far as I believe, and the economies of these "exploited" peripheral economies grew fantastically except in countries with dictators.

d) If you look at the Eastern sphere of influence, it is clear that there was as much Russian imperialism as that in the west. Again, dictatorships are never good for any rights.

As for human liberties, the biggest threat that I see is the censorship and rent seeking that the ALP and Greens are trying to foist on Australians in the name of political correctness.

Finally, I see huge differences between social democracy and Marxism, and from what I can recall there were social democratic type movements long before marxism.