Collaboration through a game

Abstract

A fair part of the surface of the Netherlands consists of peat grounds. A large part of these grounds is used for livestock farming. However, the peat needs to be dried to prevent cows and other cattle from sinking with their hooves into the soft, wet peat. This drying starts a process called oxidation. This reaction with oxygen in the air and warm sunlight results in the forming of CO2 and some methane gas, which are added to the atmosphere. Since this contributes considerably to the CO2 emissions in the Netherlands, it requires solutions to stop the oxidation process and the subsequent subsidence. It seems impossible to find a solution for this problem with which every stakeholder can agree. Five main stakeholder groups are identified in this research: the research organisations, the agricultural stakeholders, the water management organisations, the nature preservation organisations, and the administrative bodies. These parties all have their own worldview and their own ideas about the situation. This forms a controversy, which contains many different elements and different actors, in which the different stakeholder groups disagree on different elements. This controversy slows down the process of stopping the oxidation of the peat meadow grounds. Therefore, the end goal of this research is on the one hand for the different stakeholder groups to gain insight in the motives of the viewpoints of the counteracting parties. On the other hand, a new base for these stakeholder groups should be formed in which a productive situation for (renewed) collaboration is created, which can lead to more effective conversations on the future solutions in peat meadow areas. This study is approached using the methodology concept of Design-based Research.
To create a situation in which stakeholders can work together towards a solution instead of just focusing on their own priorities, the stakeholders should take a step back and build trust on other levels with the different stakeholder groups. This should help them to open up to insights that other stakeholders may have, which could lead to a situation in which they could work together. With this as a foundation, a participatory tool was chosen that could help to build a situation for a more effective collaboration: a serious game. The digital board game ‘Samen door het veen' (translation: Together through the peat) was designed, played with representative players, and analysed with the concepts of collaboration and double loop learning. The results showed that the players built more trust during the game and gained more insight into the perspective of other players, so the game seems to achieve its goals quite well. It can be concluded that the game is fun to play and that it has quite some potential for stimulating double loop learning and creating a situation in which more effective collaboration could take place.