Learning Nonviolent Resistance via Gaming

Just when you were ready to abandon all hope when it comes to gaming and youth culture, thinking that Halo2 and World of Warcraft define the available genres as all violent and aggressive, along comes a game with an altogether different theme: “A Force More Powerful.” The website asks rhetorically:

Can a computer game teach how to fight real-world adversaries— dictators, military occupiers and corrupt rulers, using methods that have succeeded in actual conflicts— not with laser rays or AK47s, but with non-military strategies and nonviolent weapons? Such a game, A Force More Powerful (AFMP), is now available. A unique collaboration of experts on nonviolent conflict working with veteran game designers has developed a simulation game that teaches the strategy of nonviolent conflict. A dozen scenarios, inspired by recent history, include conflicts against dictators, occupiers, colonizers and corrupt regimes, as well as struggles to secure the political and human rights of ethnic and racial minorities and women.

A Force More Powerful also has an organizational website with links not only to the game, but also the movie and the book with the same title. According to that site, the game is designed for a specific audience:

AFMP is designed for people who want to use nonviolent action in their own struggles for rights and freedom. The game will also serve as a valuable simulation model for academic studies of nonviolent resistance, as well as an educational tool for civil society groups and anyone who wants to learn more about the power and strategic use of nonviolent action.

Gameplay is described as:

a single-player, turn-based game in which the player takes on the role of chief strategist in a nonviolent movement against the opponent in one of ten pre-packaged scenarios. As the player takes charge of the movement’s materials and human resources, recruits new members and builds alliances, the player also learns the value of strategic planning, and the careful formulation of goals and tactics. The adversary is controlled by the game’s artificial intelligence.

The US Army has created an extremely popular free video game (America’s Army)– why shouldn’t advocates of nonviolent conflict employ similar tactics of instruction and recruitment? AFMP is currently available for Windows only, and costs $20.

Via the NPR Technology podcast for April 19, 2006.

If you’re interested in more educational games that don’t have a strictly entertainment-driven focus, check out Watercooler Games’ educational listings.

If you enjoyed this post and found it useful, subscribe to Wes’ free newsletter. Check out Wes’ video tutorial library, “Playing with Media.” Information about more ways to learn with Dr. Wesley Fryer are available on wesfryer.com/after.

On this day..

• Classroom Podcasting / Radio Shows 101 (April 2018) – 2018
• Enlisting Student Moderators for Classroom Blog Posts – 2015
• FOCU$ on Education Conference Archived Videos Online (April 2013) – 2013
• Why Map Media to the Curriculum? (April 2013) – 2013
• Cloud App Bingo – 2012
• Criticism of School District Content Filtering Policies is not a personal attack on ALL tech directors – 2010
• Welcome to the University of Oklahoma: Home of a FAKE Guest WiFi Network – 2010
• Delivering Distance Engineering Courses Utilizing Web-based Electronic Media by Kurt Gramoll #odla2010 – 2010
• Google Wave by Simon Ringsmuth #odla2010 – 2010
• Ideas for proactively planning for a school crisis with message mapping – 2009