Joy says, "i think our reading group reads more sophisticated literature than jenna's group. frankly, between you and me, it's because most of us have a graduate degree." in using the word "we," joy is referring to her:

Joy is referring to her in-group.
An in-group is a group of people sharing particular characteristics. In the case above, those characteristics are graduate degrees. Joy belongs in this group based on the fact that she too has a graduate degree as well as the rest of the members, which is why she believes they should be reading more sophisticated literature than the other group who don't have degrees. 

question 1

the reasons for the global discontent in the early 1900s were the following:

desire for independence   was the main fight of many territories which were still under the control of colonial powers. dissatisfaction with peace terms of wwi . the best example is the case of germany, that was forced by the peace treaties to pay very expensive war reparations to the winners of wwi. some time later, german leaders broke relations and stopped recognizing the authority of those who imposed sanctions on their country, counting with the support of the population that was suffering the important economic consequences of the payment of reparations. overproduction of consumer goods which led to hyperinflation scenarios and very week currencies and economies.

question 2

the reasons for the great depression were the following, and these led to wall street crash in october 1929 and caused the subsequent great recession period.

high personal debt, that ended up with many bankrupt investors. falling stock price as everybody was getting rid of the stocks, many because they could not meet the amounts of money required by the margins that backed their investments.

question 3

italy: led by the fascists and benito mussolini   and promised to restore the greatness of the roman empire. germany: led by adolph hitler and the nazi party and conducted anti-jewish riots in austriajapan: was controlled by aggressive military leaders and invaded countries for their resources

2.