I went to a political philosophy discussion group for a couple of years, held in university rooms, but open to the public, usually 4 to 8 people attending. Adve

I went to a political philosophy discussion group for a couple of years, held in university rooms, but open to the public, usually 4 to 8 people attending. Advertised on the philosophy department mailing list and maybe elsewhere. Mostly students, but whoever was in the area and interested in that week's piece would show up. I think it was for 2 hours, in the afternoon, once every 2 weeks. There was a small core of regulars and a nominal leader who had final say over what would be chosen for next time, mostly choosing from the suggestions of others at the end of the meeting, and announcing the selection online a few days later. Everyone in it seemed to be postgraduate, except me! Almost every time someone opened their mouth it was impressive. Usually the reading was a classic essay or couple of chapters from a book, not always strictly political philosophy, just somehow connected - once it was Melville's Bartleby! That was the only fiction though. Essays/bits of book by Oakeshott, Dewey, Schmitt etc. Essays by well-known philosophers I'd heard of but usually not read. Recent stuff too, by people I'd not heard of. Always an interesting choice, a very wide variety. Something you could read in a couple of hours. There was no off-topic chatting during the meeting once it got started, by choice – there was never nearly enough time to talk about what we'd read. Before and after I had some nice chats though, as I got to know the regulars a bit. It was friendly, but getting to know the writers and their writing was the main thing. I loved it so much. I even made a discussion blog for the group at the time, I wanted more discussion about each piece in the comments, but it didn't take off. I did consider organizing something like it myself. Getting exclusively such high-quality attendees seems unlikely in a non-university setting. Discussion quality would seem the tricky thing, anyway. Maybe I'm spoiled, because I've seen how good it can get. Good luck!