SFL Around the World: January 2018

North America

In North America, our major focus in January was making sure LibertyCon 2018 will be our best conference yet. We started the month strong by confirming theLiberty in Politics panel, sure to be a highlight of the LibertyCon program. With more and more people paying attention to Bitcoin, we were thrilled to announce not only the addition of the Cryptocurrency Debate but also that Bitcoin.com will be hosting an after-hours social and handing out free Bitcoin Cash to all LibertyCon attendees.

For those keeping track, this means LibertyCon will have three exciting debates!

Earlier this month, we announced that Liberty Memes, the popular Facebook page, will be coming to LibertyCon!

Elizabeth Hayes, our Director of North America Programs, was busy promoting LibertyCon this month. You can watch her give a cryptocurrency announcementoutside the Federal Reserve, see her interview Jeffrey Tucker, and partner with the Leadership Institute to give tips to all the job-seekers who come to LibertyCon.

During February, we’ll be putting the finishing touches on our LibertyCon program. We can’t wait to see you there.

Europe

Last months were an immense success for Students For Liberty Belarus! Kicking off with the stunning “End The Drug War” event in Harodnia on Dec 16, following it up with another  “End The Drug War” discussion in Bieraście on Jan 11, and already planning the next few meetings for February. Follow their Facebook page to catch all the news!

The very first Leadership Forum in Iceland took place on January 13th! This day become memorable for 16 future leaders for liberty due to a terrific lecture by Lukas Schweiger on the Importance of the Network and the Rob Duffy’s seminar on Confidence and Facing the Fear. Moreover, being a founder of the Life Choice Solutions, Rob volunteered to train one of the participants for free for 3 months!

Last week we’ve also had an explicit Alt Right Vs. Libertarianism event in Vilnius, Lithuania held by Vilnius Students For Liberty together with Lietuvos Liberalus Jaunimas which brought about 70 young students to engage in the foregoing discussion with Tom Palmer.

Brazil

January, as usual, is the quietest month in Brazil. Summer vacations, travel to the beach and people getting ready for Carnival. Therefore, realizing ground-activities wouldn’t have the impact we wanted to. With that in mind, we’ve changed our focus towards getting people trained through SFL Academy given their free time during this period of the year.

In a month we trained more than 200 people and could get our data tracking numbers updated to the date, achieving 800+ leaders trained in the whole fiscal year.

South Asia

The first colloquium of 2018 was conducted at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai by our Local Coordinator, Anas Khan and Abeed Khader, Chairman, Executive Board on the 13^th of January. The topic for the colloquium was  “Class Struggles and Individual Liberty: A market for Socialism?” Fourteen participants were shortlisted from a total 33 applications  received, who deliberated as to how market means can be used to achieve  socialist goals.

The next day, on the 14^th of January, a  debate competition was held in Bhubaneswar by our Local Co-Ordinator Aditya Agarwal in association with the Literary Society ‘The Literatis’ of School of Law, KIIT University.

On 20^th of January, “UnLockeD: Papers for a free society” was conducted at Daulat Ram College, University of Delhi in collaboration with Eclat, the economics society by our Local Coordinator Kirtika Trehan. The theme for the paper presentation was “Is Taxation a theft?.” A total of 8 papers were shortlisted and presented from among 43 applications, with Mr. Abhinav Singh, co-founder of SASFL as the judge.

Another colloquium was conducted on 27^th of January at Mahendra Multiple Campus, Nepal with a participation of 19 members on “Market Regulation” by Local Coordinator Shasank Pokharel and Regional Director Siksha Bhattarai. In addition to the Colloquium, a total of 3 Speaker’s Corner events were also conducted in Nepal by Siksha and Dhiren Pradhan, a volunteer for SASFL.

Africa

Kenya: On January 11, Local Coordinator Zebby Nyakiangana talked to students, youths on classical liberal ideas at Liberal Youth Mentorship Forum, held at Machakos Institute of Technology.

Rwanda & République Démocratique du Congo: On January 11 & 13, 2018, Students For Liberty Rwanda, and the République Démocratique du Congo organized a meet-up to integrate the newly accepted Local Coordinators into SFL family.

South Africa: ASFL Southern Africa Regional Director, Nicholas Woode-Smith spoke at Cape Town liberty meet-up on ASFL’s important contributions in promoting freedom and prosperity across the continent and the world.  ASFL members in attendance also enjoyed hearing presentations about blockchain, entrepreneurship.

Morocco: 24 January, 2018 was the day SFL Morocco was inaugurated. The event held at the Arab Center for Scientific Studies and Human Studies laid the foundation for the group’s activities in promoting freedom and liberty in North Africa. With so much promise for the future, the group is poised to take a steady step towards a new future; taking into consideration the scientific, intellectual developments and the current situation that proved the effectiveness of engaging the student body in enriching the intellectual field.

See the full African update.