Governing by Video Game
Cities across the United States are exploring online games as a way of engaging citizens. But being a citizen isn’t the same thing as being a gamer.
Trust in governments and regulators is in crisis. Only 17% of Americans say they trust the government, according to the Pew Research Center, down from nearly 80% in the 1960s. Given the current state of our politics and uncertainty in the global economy, this isn’t exactly surprising. Whether at the local, national, or international levels, we tend to think those in charge aren’t doing a good job.
One cause of this is that people feel detached from governance, leaving them disillusioned about the ability of policymakers to affect their lives for the better. In the United States and across Europe, a restless electorate feels their voices aren’t being listened to, fueling support for populist political parties. What if there were an easy way to improve this?
Imagine a government that measures people’s civic value and ranks citizens’ contributions on leaderboards. And then imagine that public participation in policymaking and local issues were as simple as playing a game. This gamification of governance is the subject of a recent book called Games, Powers, and Democracies by Gianluca Sgueo, a professor of…
