At China’s most prestigious universities, groups of students are spending their leisure time hanging out with security guards, construction workers and janitors.
They lend a hand to cafeteria workers, helping them collect dirty trays and clean tables. At other times, they organize movie screenings for the staff, help fix their mobile phones or just hang out with them at hole-in-the-wall restaurants.
Some students have even joined the female workers in “square dancing” – the kind of synchronized dancing other urban millennials have snubbed as boorish and outdated.
These youngsters call themselves Marxists and support the official communist ideology. But their alliance with these mostly poor, less educated workers has recently alarmed the ruling Communist Party, making the students targets of a harsh crackdown on activism.
Growing up amid China’s unprecedented economic boom, young Chinese are witnessing growing inequality and rampant labor rights abuse, at the same time that they’re being taught Karl Marx’s theory of capitalist exploitation in school.
A 21-year-old student at Renmin University in Beijing, who declined to be named for fear of punishment by the school, grew up hearing stories about her uncles who sneaked into Europe in the ’80s to work in factories run by other Chinese. They worked hard but struggled to pay for flights back home.
From a small town in the southern China, she also remembers the left-behind children of her hometown, brought up by poorly educated grandparents while their parents worked in big cities.
At Renmin University, literally “People’s University,” she came across migrant workers who, just like her uncles, were working long hours but earning little money.
So she joined the New Light People’s Development Association, a student group that supports campus workers by organizing free clinics, night schools and dance parties.
“I have a natural compassion for workers and farmers,” she said. “In their life, there are so many things that are unfair and unreasonable.”
China’s top universities are increasingly filled with students from middle-class or upper-middle-class households which have the money and resources to get their children ahead in the education race.
But even in schools where many are busy studying for the GRE and looking for investment banking internships, sympathy towards laborers is spreading.
At Nanjing University in eastern China, students at Marxist labor rights groups have also taken up canteen work and square dancing.
In a widely-shared social media post in October, one student activist said she was angered by the suffering of Chinese workers who had been laid off, forced out of their cheap apartments or denied compensation for occupational illness.
“My parents want me to live my own peaceful life, and stay away from trouble,” said the 21-year-old, who declined to be named for fear of retaliation.
“But I think there are many problems in our society we should try to solve. I need to be responsible to society instead of focusing on my own life.”
Student activism has long been a worry of the ruling Communist Party. In 1989, it was a group of university students that started a nationwide, long-running pro-democracy protest, which ended in a bloody crackdown in Beijing.
In Taiwan and Hong Kong, students have in recent years staged massive pro-democracy movements that gained international support.
In response, China has in recent years stepped up ideological control on campus and in wider society. Universities are told to make their dry lectures on Marxism – mandatory for all students – more interesting, and eliminate advocacy for liberal democracy in class.
But such ideological pushes have contributed to a different kind of activism.
Students are being inspired by the 19th-century German philosopher, and finding that his ideals don’t quite line up with the China they know.
They’re clashing with the authorities under the banner of socialism, a concept that is also ostensibly supported by the Chinese leaders.
“When everyone is trying to climb up [the social ladder] themselves, Marxism feels like a spring breeze to me.” the Nanjing University student said. “As Marxists, the most important thing is to have an emotional bond with the workers, and regard their suffering as our own.”
She was among the dozens of students who traveled to the southern province of Guangdong this summer to support workers attempting to unionize at Shenzhen-based Jasic Technology, a welding machinery manufacturer.
In online posts, these activists pledged to defend Marxism and Maoism by protecting workers’ rights against “local vicious forces.” They claim to stand with the Communist leadership and learn from President Xi Jinping’s own experience working in the fields.
Cheng Chen, a political scientist at University at Albany in New York, says the rising popularity of Marxism among young Chinese is a result of China’s growing power and a global decline in liberalism.
“There are still many active liberal intellectuals in China who are critical of the government, but they are seen as elitist and largely out of touch with the plight of ordinary people,” she said, adding that many Chinese liberals had stayed quiet during the Shenzhen protest and the #MeToo movement.
“When liberalism is in retreat, it is unsurprising that left-wing ideologies are in ascendance at Chinese universities.”
In China, “leftists” refer to those who uphold Communist ideologies, while the “right-wing” advocates for liberal democracy and civil freedoms. Labor rights movements were in the past largely carried out by the “right-wing” democrats, and were suppressed by the Communist Party.
Cheng Chen said the students might be counting on using Marxist rhetoric to get the government on their side. If that was the hope, they’ve been proved wrong.
A number of student activists at the Shenzhen factory protest were placed under house arrest for weeks after they were forced to leave the area during the summer.
At least two Peking University students have gone missing, after they were seen being taken away by authorities in August. Several former graduates who participated in the protest also disappeared last week.
This week, the school administration warned all students against taking part in labor activism demonstrations, according to Reuters.
Marxist groups on campus are now struggling. Social media posts advocating for labor rights are often censored. Some members alleged they have been put under close watch by teachers and schoolmates.
The Renmin University student said she was shocked and angered by the sweeping crackdown.
“I think what we are doing should be supported by the government,” she said. “We grew up in a socialist country. Renmin University has taught us to stand with the workers.”
The New Light People’s Development Association at Renmin was praised in 2015 by the official People’s Daily newspaper for helping migrant workers. But now it is struggling to get people to come to its free clinics, movie screenings and square dancing events.
Migrant workers are reluctant to attend the activities because of pressure from the university and its contractors, according to members of New Light. Many student new joiners have recently quit the group, after they were summoned for talks by school teachers.
The Communist Party has been suppressing any kind of activism that could undermine its authority. The spreading wave of Marxism among China’s passionate, educated youngsters is seen as a new threat to the socialist regime.
In the name of communism, the square dancers may have to stand still.