C O V E R S T O R Y
Fishing for understanding:
Let simulation and gaming help
Valdis Bisters explains board games that make training more effective
Growing interest in a sustainable environment has motivated various professional people to seek more rational and imaginative management tools to help them understand the complex, dynamic and social nature of environmental issues. These tools also provide them with the means to better use natural resources.
The simulation and gaming methodology offers a unique contribution to the field of environmental training. It provides a learning opportunity in which results of decisionmaking are immediately felt in a low-risk environment. It allows participants to explore the natural and social processes on a dynamic scale and to establish verbalization and social skills, which are so important in collective decisionmaking.
Interactive learning
The training courses that we run comprise different kinds of simulations and games. There are simple role plays, manual games and computer-assisted operational games. Environmental training must emphasize development options not only of topics but also for the students themselves. An environmental specialist must acquire new knowledge and skills through the problem solving process. The choice of decision options should rest on rational analysis, synthesis, evaluation and action. In the experiential learning cycle, the involvement and consequent higher motivation of trainees intensify the acquisition of knowledge and skills.
The most effective game models maintain high credibility while keeping a simple and user-friendly manner. All the parts of the instructional materials and game kits must be easily replaceable, and no significant preliminary work and background knowledge should be required from the administrators and participants. Also, it must be possible to involve a whole class of up to 30 people, and the materials should be available for running on a broad range of computer platforms. In the category of such simulation games, Fish Banks Ltd. STRATAGEM-1 (Meadows, 1985 and 1987) deserves especial consideration.
Sustaining shared resources
Fish Banks is a computer-assisted simulation board game that deals with renewable resource management. The game focuses on the interaction between a nation's fish banks and a number of competing fishing companies. Up to six teams can play. Each team assumes the role of the top management of one of the country's principal fishing companies. All the teams begin with equal fleets of ships and equal bank accounts. The teams make annual decisions on whether to buy or sell ships and on where to fish. The game leader enters the teams' decisions into the computer, which then calculates the conditions a year later. The goal for each competing team is to attain the greatest wealth by the end of the game. The game, which lasts three to four hours including debriefing, can be run by the game administrator and computer operator so participants do not have to work on a computer.
Fish Banks Ltd. is an effective educational tool for teaching sustainable management of fishery resources because it is both highly instructive and entertaining. This model can be used to increase political understanding of the important public policies controlling a common renewable resource, a concept first described by Garret Hardin as the "tragedy of the commons."
Policy decisions and the environment
STRATAGEM is an abbreviation of Strategy-Game-Management. The topic is covered by the integrated national economy model STRATAGEM-1, a computer-assisted board game that teaches the dynamics of energy and environment interaction. The players assume the roles of ministers in an imaginary country. They make decisions on policy and on the allocation of food, goods and energy, and the computer simulates the results. There are five types of ministry: population; energy; industry and social services; food production and environmental protection; and foreign trade and finances. The ministers are in charge of one sector, such as population and household consumption; energy production and energy efficiency; food production and environmental protection; goods production and human services; or international finance, exports, imports and debt. The goal of the cabinet minister is to make decisions about resource allocation that promote balanced growth. The game is not designed to model any particular country but instead concentrates on situations common to all developing nations. The game lasts six to eight hours and progresses throughout a period of 50 years. It is possible to include five to 40 participants managing up to four countries.
A CESAMS team 'hard at play' to learn new skills.
When to use the games
Fish Banks is a very good way of starting a variety of environmental training courses. The game forces participants to get to know each other, to communicate and to challenge collective decisionmaking, as well as to understand system-thinking perceptions based on system-dynamic principles. The participants begin to recognize a number of hidden mechanisms lying at the base of economic and ecological systems. Discussion about the game procedure and relations in the system reveals that ignorance of elementary dependence on the environment brings about inevitably dire consequences. Moreover, individual environmental consciousness may be unsuccessful if others do not take similar responsibility. The others must also try to adopt an environmentally-friendly way of operating. Participants find that even a small collective effort may reduce considerably the exploitation of natural resources, and obviously in sustainable management policies.
STRATAGEM is a great way of completing the courses. The participants are encouraged to apply the policymaking and collective problem solving skills they have learned to develop a long-term strategy for the national economy. The game gives a comprehensive picture of interrelatedness in a similarly complex system because it shows how the environment is not just an isolated part of society but instead represents a natural, social and economic area. We usually try to expand the debriefing of the game into a discussion about environmental policy, energy, agriculture and industry in relation to sustainability in Latvia in recent years.
| WHERE TO GET THE GAMES |
Kits with all materials required to play Fish Banks Ltd. and STRATAGEM can be ordered at the price of $100 per kit. Mac and PC versions are available. Each kit includes one disk; for each additional disk in any format add $5. Shipping costs depend on the mode and the destination. For information, contact:
- Dennis Meadows, director
- IPSSR
- University of New Hampshire
- Thomson Hall #301
- Durham, NH 03824, USA
- Fax: (603) 862-4140, e-mail: meadows@unh.edu
|
Part of a balanced program
It is now clear that training in complex interdisciplinary problems can be tackled effectively by the simulation and game technique. The annual conference of International Simulation and Gaming Association, which took place in Latvia in 1996, presented some good examples of solutions to sustainable development issues. The topic of the conference was simulation and gaming for sustainable development.
The conference underlined once more that the power of interactive learning can be combined in a balanced way with other methods. Simulations and games alone will not provide all the necessary knowledge. You have to consider many factors, including the time available, the facilitator's confidence, the audience's experience, etc. A lecture combined with game debriefing will open new possibilities for getting your point across. What remains for us, the facilitators, to do is this: try out and play sustainability so that it won't be reality which plays with us.
References:
Meadows, D. and Toth, F. 1985. "Stratagem-1: A microcomputer-based management training game on the dynamics of energy/environment interaction." Simulation and Games No. 2.
Meadows, D., Fiddaman, T., Shannon, D. 1987. "Fish Banks, Ltd. A microcomputer-assisted simulation teaching the principles for sustainable management of renewable resources," The International Network for Resource Information Centers.
Valdis Bisters is deputy director of the Center for Environmental Science and Management Studies at the University of Latvia. In 1996-97 he is president of the International Simulation and Gaming Association.
REC * EMTC * PUBLICATIONS * INSIGHT * WINTER-SPRING 1997
