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I know someone that’s done this and he’s had a lot of success!
I suggest choosing a cafe near campus that has a space for privacy. My comrade chose a DIY that’s known to be pretty outwardly leftist, and they arranged for him to have the green room to himself once a week for the reading group. He also taped a QR code to his laptop bag that linked up to a group chat, as well as flyers that he posted around campus.
As far as recruiting people - he just reached out to other students in his classes, and asked them to invite their friends. Only a few people showed up for the first reading group, but now (a couple months later) there’s about 10-12 people that regularly show up. It really helps to make sure everyone has input on the direction you take the reading group; let people suggest ideas for what the group can read next, and go out of your way to answer any questions anyone has.
It might also help to join a socialist reading group yourself just to get some ideas on how to organize something like this.
I don’t know why everyone on here is acting so sketched out. There are plenty of openly socialist reading groups in most colleges. My comrade’s reading group is openly Marxist-Leninist, as well as transparent about being connected to a communist party. You need to be honest with people about what the group is about. If you just say it’s vaguely about “economics”, you’re likely going to have clueless people showing up that will cause problems when they find out it’s a Marxist reading group. The party I am in is *not* liked by everyone on campus; we’re banned from the leftist bookstore, and we’ve had our flyers removed, etc. Sometimes at events people scream at us and make all kinds of accusations, but no one feels unsafe on campus; we haven’t had a single issue with the reading group. Honestly, no one cares, even if they think the party is horrible. I don’t know what country you live in, but if you’re in the US, you should be fine. If you’re unaffiliated with a party and just starting a normal socialist reading group, you’ll go completely under the radar and be left alone
No problem! At the start, I’d choose something that’s available for free on pdf. For my comrade’s first meeting, he chose an essay to read during the reading group, but that’s a bit unorthodox and not what I’d always recommend. I think Capital is a great start because it’s available for free online and many people *want* to read it, but they’re intimidated by reading it on their own. Any books on socialism you choose after will also be much easier to understand once they’ve read Capital. Engles’ Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State is another great introductory read for the same reason
All this aside, what are you comfortable introducing to the group? If they ask questions, do you feel comfortable trying to answer them, or at least feel comfortable knowing where to look for the answers? Would you be able to summarize each chapter and ask questions that provoke a good discussion? This will be what ultimately keeps people engaged and coming back.
It might help to spend the first meeting just going over introductions and asking the group members what they want to learn about; it’s good to kind of gauge where they are and meet them there. You might have people showing up that can’t tell you what socialism is, but they’re there because they want to learn. In that case, it might be a good idea to start with something very rudimentary to catch them up. These are all things you can also go over in the discord/group chat before your first meeting
Are there any orgs In your area? Even if you don’t want to join them reaching out to them might get you a couple people and they probably have connections with socialists around the college.
Poster everywhere you can where people will see. After they are up for a week take them down and put a new set up with an altered design. Make a social media and discord for the club and link them on your posters. Place and time for the meeting, too. Ideally greet everybody who joins the discord and ask them why they joined to weed out trolls and ops.
Once you have a few meetings and a handful of members you go from there, you can all figure it out together.
And make sure to acquaint yourself with the rules about clubs and postering.
If you want university resources, you could name it something like "Mutual Aid Club" so the university sees it as another volunteering club. "Student Solidarity" as a generic peer tutoring club. Use a term that leftists recognize that's not inherently political. You will need to do whatever you officially told your university to maintain support, but you'll be able to attract like-minded people and be able to siphon off resources from the university for the reading group.
If you don't care about university support for this, WeepingSong gave a solid response. You may also want to consider not directly looking for students, but people in your age range. I know a lot of young leftists who work near my university that are not students. Put flyers in places like coffee shops or local bookstores, talk to workers whenever you can.
Post fliers with a shortened link to a group chat, pray people join and you can figure it out from there. Do the same in any virtual forums relevant to the campus and topic.
Its not really important where but discord is a good choice for any communication that you dont mind possibly finding its way into the hands of cops.
Obviously if youre gonna do stuff radical enough to potentially put you at legal risk ideally avoid the internet entirely for that. Othereise discord is a good choice.
Please acquaint yourself with the rules on the sidebar and read this comment before commenting. **Personal attacks and harassment will not be tolerated.** Bigotry and hate speech will be met with immediate bans; socialism is an intrinsically inclusive system and bigotry is oppressive, exclusionary, and not conducive to a healthy and productive learning space. **This subreddit is not for questioning the basics of socialism. There are numerous debate subreddits available for those purposes. This is a place to learn.** Short or nonconstructive answers will be deleted without explanation. Please only answer if you know your stuff. Speculation has no place on this sub. Outright false information will be removed immediately. **If your post was removed due to normalized ableist slurs, please edit your post. The mods will then approve it.** Please read the ongoing discussion in a thread before replying in order to avoid misunderstandings and creating an unproductive environment. **Liberalism and sectarian bias is strictly moderated.** Stay constructive and don't bash other socialist tendencies! (Criticism is fine, low-effort baiting is not.) Help us keep the subreddit informative and helpful by reporting posts that break these rules. Thank you! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Socialism_101) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Post flyers and hand out quarter sheets with a date and time for the first meeting.
I know someone that’s done this and he’s had a lot of success! I suggest choosing a cafe near campus that has a space for privacy. My comrade chose a DIY that’s known to be pretty outwardly leftist, and they arranged for him to have the green room to himself once a week for the reading group. He also taped a QR code to his laptop bag that linked up to a group chat, as well as flyers that he posted around campus. As far as recruiting people - he just reached out to other students in his classes, and asked them to invite their friends. Only a few people showed up for the first reading group, but now (a couple months later) there’s about 10-12 people that regularly show up. It really helps to make sure everyone has input on the direction you take the reading group; let people suggest ideas for what the group can read next, and go out of your way to answer any questions anyone has. It might also help to join a socialist reading group yourself just to get some ideas on how to organize something like this. I don’t know why everyone on here is acting so sketched out. There are plenty of openly socialist reading groups in most colleges. My comrade’s reading group is openly Marxist-Leninist, as well as transparent about being connected to a communist party. You need to be honest with people about what the group is about. If you just say it’s vaguely about “economics”, you’re likely going to have clueless people showing up that will cause problems when they find out it’s a Marxist reading group. The party I am in is *not* liked by everyone on campus; we’re banned from the leftist bookstore, and we’ve had our flyers removed, etc. Sometimes at events people scream at us and make all kinds of accusations, but no one feels unsafe on campus; we haven’t had a single issue with the reading group. Honestly, no one cares, even if they think the party is horrible. I don’t know what country you live in, but if you’re in the US, you should be fine. If you’re unaffiliated with a party and just starting a normal socialist reading group, you’ll go completely under the radar and be left alone
Thanks for the advice, what can I do about accessing the texts and choosing which book to start with?
No problem! At the start, I’d choose something that’s available for free on pdf. For my comrade’s first meeting, he chose an essay to read during the reading group, but that’s a bit unorthodox and not what I’d always recommend. I think Capital is a great start because it’s available for free online and many people *want* to read it, but they’re intimidated by reading it on their own. Any books on socialism you choose after will also be much easier to understand once they’ve read Capital. Engles’ Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State is another great introductory read for the same reason All this aside, what are you comfortable introducing to the group? If they ask questions, do you feel comfortable trying to answer them, or at least feel comfortable knowing where to look for the answers? Would you be able to summarize each chapter and ask questions that provoke a good discussion? This will be what ultimately keeps people engaged and coming back. It might help to spend the first meeting just going over introductions and asking the group members what they want to learn about; it’s good to kind of gauge where they are and meet them there. You might have people showing up that can’t tell you what socialism is, but they’re there because they want to learn. In that case, it might be a good idea to start with something very rudimentary to catch them up. These are all things you can also go over in the discord/group chat before your first meeting
I'm not trying to dissuade you but please stay safe.
This means vetting members when they join, and being acquainted with campus rules, mainly
Are there any orgs In your area? Even if you don’t want to join them reaching out to them might get you a couple people and they probably have connections with socialists around the college.
Poster everywhere you can where people will see. After they are up for a week take them down and put a new set up with an altered design. Make a social media and discord for the club and link them on your posters. Place and time for the meeting, too. Ideally greet everybody who joins the discord and ask them why they joined to weed out trolls and ops. Once you have a few meetings and a handful of members you go from there, you can all figure it out together. And make sure to acquaint yourself with the rules about clubs and postering.
If you want university resources, you could name it something like "Mutual Aid Club" so the university sees it as another volunteering club. "Student Solidarity" as a generic peer tutoring club. Use a term that leftists recognize that's not inherently political. You will need to do whatever you officially told your university to maintain support, but you'll be able to attract like-minded people and be able to siphon off resources from the university for the reading group. If you don't care about university support for this, WeepingSong gave a solid response. You may also want to consider not directly looking for students, but people in your age range. I know a lot of young leftists who work near my university that are not students. Put flyers in places like coffee shops or local bookstores, talk to workers whenever you can.
Post fliers with a shortened link to a group chat, pray people join and you can figure it out from there. Do the same in any virtual forums relevant to the campus and topic.
Should I make a discord or start a group chat elsewhere? Thanks for the advice!
Its not really important where but discord is a good choice for any communication that you dont mind possibly finding its way into the hands of cops. Obviously if youre gonna do stuff radical enough to potentially put you at legal risk ideally avoid the internet entirely for that. Othereise discord is a good choice.
Post on your university’s subreddit. If there is one…
Advertise it as being about economics. Of course, that might put people off if they think it is about Samuelson... :)