Student organisations

[ed miliband]

A few questions, all of which apply almost solely to Britain:

1. Why are Trotskyist groups so prevalent within British universities? It seems more or less every 'socialist' society / group is aligned with either the SWP or the SP (CWI).

2. What are 'Communist Students' like? I know they are linked to the CPGB, however they seem to be working a lot with The Commune, or at least there seems to be a lot of communication between the two organisations.

3. Does anybody know about the 'Autonomous Students Network'?


Thanks in advance.

[Quail]

1. I have no idea, really, other than that perhaps the trot groups are quite big where I am, and they focus a lot on recruiting. In Sheffield there is quite a good anarchist presence though, which is nice.

2. In my first year of uni, I went to a couple of Communist Students discussions. The members I knew were also in the CPGB. I don't really know a hell of a lot about them really though, because the members at my uni moved away. There was a meeting for communist students at the CPGB's event, so I'm guessing that they are quite closely linked. I'm not sure how they're related to The Commune though.

3. I'm in the facebook group for the Autonomous Students Network, but I actually don't know how active they are because I haven't really heard from them. I think they were trying to organise against cuts last year, but the Sheffield anti-cuts campaign was pretty woeful/non-existent last year.

I'm not sure how useful my reply is, but oh well.

[ed miliband]

I'm looking to go to Leeds so I'm interested about anarchism in Yorkshire. Sheffield definitely seems to have a more active libertarian movement than Leeds, though it's sort of hard to tell over the internet.

[Quail]

There is an AFed group in Leeds, but I'm not sure what else there is. I only really know about what's going on in Sheffield, unfortunately.

[bricolage]

I used to be involved in ASN a bit when I was a student and am still on the mailing list. It's basically a networking tool more than an organisation so to speak (although it does have a founding statements or something similar), a way of linking up various groups and individuals. There was a meeting at the anarchist bookfair this year and it looks like its getting more people involved in it. I think it is a good initiative and worth getting involved in if only to make contacts and share tools, information, materials etc. There was talk of producing some material or pamphlets or something at one point but nothing really happened, right now some people are working on a 'free university' idea that I don't know too much about. There is a email list and a forum on libcom, as well as a blog that is quite new.

Here are some links;
http://libcom.org/forums/groups/autonomous-student-network
http://autonomousstudentsnetwork.wordpress.com/

So yeah I'd recommend getting on the list etc even if it doesn't come to much and there definitely some people from Leeds there. As for Leeds itself The Really Open University looks really promising; http://reallyopenuniversity.wordpress.com/

Oh yeah Communist Students, well they were founded by CPGB members and are linked to the CPGB but seem to have non members involved with, you mentioned the Commune and I also think they put on a meeting by the ICC in Manchester. They tend to have meetings, day schools etc at various times. Dunno much else, I don't agree with them on a lot of things but I'd take working with them over the various Trot groups any day of the week.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

The only semi-active Socialist group here in York is Socialist Students, affiliated to SPEW. They told me they weren't and then invited me to Socialism 2010 and gave me lots of SPEW literature.

They are completely non-active, too. Bullshit.

[ed miliband]

I used to be involved in ASN a bit when I was a student and am still on the mailing list. It's basically a networking tool more than an organisation so to speak (although it does have a founding statements or something similar), a way of linking up various groups and individuals. There was a meeting at the anarchist bookfair this year and it looks like its getting more people involved in it. I think it is a good initiative and worth getting involved in if only to make contacts and share tools, information, materials etc. There was talk of producing some material or pamphlets or something at one point but nothing really happened, right now some people are working on a 'free university' idea that I don't know too much about. There is a email list and a forum on libcom, as well as a blog that is quite new.

Here are some links;
http://libcom.org/forums/groups/autonomous-student-network
http://autonomousstudentsnetwork.wordpress.com/

So yeah I'd recommend getting on the list etc even if it doesn't come to much and there definitely some people from Leeds there. As for Leeds itself The Really Open University looks really promising; http://reallyopenuniversity.wordpress.com/

Oh yeah Communist Students, well they were founded by CPGB members and are linked to the CPGB but seem to have non members involved with, you mentioned the Commune and I also think they put on a meeting by the ICC in Manchester. They tend to have meetings, day schools etc at various times. Dunno much else, I don't agree with them on a lot of things but I'd take working with them over the various Trot groups any day of the week.

Cheers, this was really useful.

From the little glimpses I've had at the student left so far I think the idea of a general, loose network for left-libertarian students is probably the best strategy for attracting students away from the 'official left', so to speak.

[Android]

1. Why are Trotskyist groups so prevalent within British universities? It seems more or less every 'socialist' society / group is aligned with either the SWP or the SP (CWI).

I think it is to do with the relative decline of the left in Britain over the last two decades - an effect of this is that these groups focus on orienting to and recruiting students and it is reflected in the fact that there core membership is dominated by students and academics.


2. What are 'Communist Students' like? I know they are linked to the CPGB, however they seem to be working a lot with The Commune, or at least there seems to be a lot of communication between the two organisations.

I am involved in the Manchester group. You are right that is is linked to CPGB in that it was student members and supporters who set it up. The Manchester group has three CPGB members, the rest of the group is comprised of a member of the commune and independents.

The group's activity is mainly focused around political education, production of a bulletin and participating in the the anti-cuts groups. For example, the bulletin (http://thecommune.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/theeducator1.pdf) is only a very recent initiative and was largely the work of myself, another independent and the member of the commune (who is Markyb on here).


3. Does anybody know about the 'Autonomous Students Network'?
Don't really know that much about them.