Role-Playing Game Research - Role-Playing Games and Politics

Greetings Elliott Wiseman,

Thank you for reaching out to RPG Research. The following is off the top of my head with a tight schedule, so I haven't had time to do a deeper dive, but from the top of my memory, hopefully you find these useful starting points for a deeper dive.

We are aware of a number of programs using role-playing games to help with learning about or understanding ethics, sociological, societal, and historical topics, which much of the time include "political" topics as part of the topics addressed.

Political conversations, as you know, can often cause much tension and can be polarizing, TRPGs have been shown to be a safer space to address these topics because of the social contract of the rules and alibi's provided by the player characters to address topics in more constructive ways that might otherwise devolve into entrenched arguments.

This is why we include in our gaming consent tools (https://www.gameconsent.com/), asking if people are comfortable with discussion of sex, religion, politics, and other such topics that traditionally were considered "rude to discuss in mixed company".

Example discussion of increasing consent discussions in gaming illustrated here by Professor Sarah Lynne Bowman

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/larp-and-consent-culture

We have found that historical learning about politics in the past through RPGs to be very effective, but overtly shoe-horning current political sensibilities (especially with any specific views versus providing opportunities for discovery of a range of views) to be less effective, unless performed well-designed and delivered compelling storytelling experiential discovery rather than current trend of blunt agenda being poorly implemented due to an immature approach, sacrificing good storytelling to achieve specific bullet list items. This is true for many topics in RPGs for Education, doing it through good storytelling and experiential learning works well, but just crudely "storifying" and poor "gamification" are not as consistently effective. J.R.R. Tolkien, in Beowulf: Monsters and Critics addressed these concepts very well, and how "Fantasy" well delivered/written is much more effective when written for "applicability" versus "allegory", as well as the buffer that such settings provide to discuss difficult topics, this is further enhanced with the TRPG experience.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf:_The_Monsters_and_the_Critics

There are challenges with such approaches in the classroom. There are many such efforts. I taught RPGs in the classroom for high schoolers 5 days per week back in 1985, and Rebecca Thomas since 1989.

Rebecca Thomas teaching through RPGs since 1989:

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/community/worlwide-list-of-providers/role-play-workshop

Other examples of teachers using RPGs in the classroom to teach a variety of topics including history and politics:

 https://w3.rpgresearch.com/blog/dungeons-and-dragons-rolls-into-the-classroom-a-response

Østerskov Efterskole, Denmark - https://osterskov.dk/in-english/

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/2004-the-great-war-in-the-classroom-cruz-laura

Playing with Ethics: Experiencing New Ways of Being in RPGs. David Simkins. University of Wisconsin–Madison, USA

https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Playing-with-Ethics%3A-Experiencing-New-Ways-of-Being-Simkins/e6306208626327a42fbe66d0c4650b421b858a1f

Professor Sarah Lynne Bowman has written a fair amount on topics that potentially parallel what you are looking for. While I don't know if she has performed a form study, she writes extensively on her views of these topics throughout her various works.

You'll want to look for other tidbits like this in the other studies, that while not focused on politics, often do bring up this area as a portion of the papers. You can use keyword searching on our sites to find some of these nuggets, for example "politic" or "politics" in the search bar on these sites:

www.rpgresearch.com

w3.rpgresearch.com

www2.rpgresearch.com

While a psychology study, it includes topics that are relevant for considering how to RPGs can be helpful in approaching political topics in life:

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/1988-therapy-is-fantasy-role-playing-healing-and-the-construction-of-symbolic-order

Off the top of my head I am not sure I recall any quantitative causal peer-reviewed published studies specifically on "politics", but throughout many of the studies in the papers such topics are often addressed. Role-playing games and gamers have often been the brunt of political battles, including "culture wars", the most well known being the backlash in the 80s onward related to the Moral/Satanic Panic that lead to RPGs being banned at schools, libraries, and still banned in most prisons.

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/repo/2007-rpgr-a00006

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/blog/another-example-of-inculcated-stigma-regarding-role-playing-gamers

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/blog/mother-to-child-those-kinds-of-people-kill-people-role-playing-gamers

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/1989-game-hysteria-and-the-truth-part-two-stackpole-michael-a

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/1995-role-playing-games-the-stigmas-and-benefits-william-j-walton

There is an interesting bibliography on Geek Culture literature, including political views of the tech subculture, and others, that you might interesting at least, and perhaps useful:

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/role-playing-games-and-the-christian-right-community-formation-in-response-to-a-moral-panic-1

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/geekculture-an-annotated-interdisciplinary-bibliography

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-news/maine-state-senator-playing-orc-on-world-of-warcraft-elected-despite-opponents-attacks-on-her-gaming-hobby

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/collateral-damage-mccain-blows-saving-throw-in-attack-on-dungeons-dragons

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/apology-from-mccains-campaign-blogger-about-dnd-bashing

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/the-attacks-on-role-playing-games

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/should-a-christian-play-dungeons-dragons

See line item 21 of banned leisure items: https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/mi-dept-corrections-banning-dungeons-and-dragons-04_07_112_402275_7.pdf/view

One of our previous volunteer staff members, Terrance MacMullan PhD, is a philosophy professor at one of the universities we have worked with (Eastern Washington University) and has run ethics classes including uses and correlations with TRPG to help learn and discuss such topics, including numerous publications on the philosophy of race, Latin American philosophy, and pop culture and philosophy: https://www.ewu.edu/experts/terrance-macmullan/

I have run programs as a therapist for decades (peers introduce me as "The Grandfather of Therapeutic Gaming" because I have been studying the effects and uses of RPGS since the 1970s), and I have, in my practice, often used RPGs for political intrigue, learning, topics. One of my favorite settings to use for such topics is the Babylon 5 RPG, and for grittier (and more mature players) Thieves' World, Middle-earth and Doctor Who. I have used the Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones) RPG but the setting tends to heavily push players towards more Machiavellian attitudes (no surprise there), which is useful for teaching about such concepts, but less helpful for illustrating other concepts. I have also adapted for Greyhawk settings as well. I have found the best settings in our programs for covering in-game politics that can provide healthy opportunities for discussion and learning related to real-world parallels of topics to be J. Michael Strazinsky's Babylon 5 and J.R.R. Tolkien's MIddle-earth (despite some groups pushing against Tolkien's works in recent years). JMS's Babylon 5 TV series was built based heavily on psychology, philosophy, history, religion and politics heavily interspersed throughout the TV episodes and are well represented of the many current political topics, so easily introduced in-game.

While not exactly focused on political "learning", there are a number of gaming groups around the world that have fragmented into specific identity groups due to politics. For example the Christian Gamers Group, and the Spokane Gamer Girls Group.

https://w3.rpgresearch.com/research/archives/public/public-blogs-test/others-research/2013-christian-gamers-guild-faq-frequently-asked-questions-by-christians-about-role-playing-games

I have run groups with highly opposed identity and political views, and find the TRPG setting helps them overcome profoundly polarized views and be able to set them aside to enjoy the game.

For example, around 1989, in a city/county jail, I ran TRPG sessions with 12 inmates during a lock-down period after two rival gangs had been involved in a stabbing and fight (Latino and Black rival gangs) There were members of both gangs, as well as a pair of white supremecists, a rival Vietnamese gang member, another who was Navajo, among others. They were able to fully set aside their issues and participate in the Middle-earth Role-Playing sessions very well, while the other units had repeated outbreaks of violence. I have had similar successes with other rival gang members at the same table in our community center programs as well.

Many discussions about identity, in-group/out-group, hierarchy levels of power, war, etc. happen after many game sessions specific to the setting, but clearly paralleling real-world topics. In our community setting we explicitly discourage people from discussing current real-world political topics at the game table for our regular Drop In and RPG Programs (we've been running such programs since 1977). We try to keep our Drop Ins as safe and welcoming as possible to the widest range of populations possible (ages 2.5 years old through senior adults, and everyone in-between, many with disabilities and neurological distinctions), and have had decades of practice dialing that in. We have found that allowing any such discussion at the table ends up causing an exclusionary environment no matter what the topic. This was true 20-30 years ago, and still holds true today. However, discussion of basically the exact same topics, about the in-game politics are encouraged in what we call the "post session processing" discussions after every session, and as long as the GM Facilitator guides the conversation to stay in-game, the Magic Circle helps buffer the emotional upsets that would happen without that protection of the imaginary setting.

That being said, any efforts to "push an agenda" politically in the games generally drives people out, making gaming increasingly UN-inclusive, rather than providing an inclusive environment open to discussion. This has been helpful for better connecting with very specific sub-groups, which is wonderful, but it has been at the cost of driving away much more of the general population, and alienating adoption by potential new players, in large part because 99% of the RPG publishing "is doing it wrong" in their approach to introducing new players to TRPGs. https://w3.rpgresearch.com/blog/breaking-down-the-rpg-barriers-to-entry-with-bfrpg

Some recent efforts by some RPG publishers such as Wizards of the Coast, White Wolf, and others, to inject current politically motivated content, has driven away and fractured the gaming community dramatically. Most of this fracturing is mostly observed in the USA, Canada, and some parts of Western Europe so far. Most of our programs on the rest of the world (we have run programs in South America, Africa, throughout Europe, Russia, China, Pakistan, India, Australia, all over) look at many of North America's political debate topics very confused about a lot of the current battles and polarization, and are finding some of the content coming into the RPG publications increasingly alienating as never before. This isn't as much about the effort to be more inclusive (good thing), it is the more overt, and frankly "ham handed" approach that has been used so far, that is making gaming more fracturing. Historically, from observation during our community programs running since 1977, until a few years ago, TRPGs sessions were much more inclusive and welcoming to all groups and identities (even if the content itself on the surface was otherwise), despite the many glaring issues with some of the older game settings/materials. I expect/hope these issues of immature writing will work itself out over time as the industry matures.

Unfortunately right now RPGs are becoming increasingly "infected" by political polarization, and other variations of Balkanization by Fiat. The irony is, as I illustrated, RPGs were able to unify many people and cultures from around the world, including violently rival gang members and incarcerated populations, to unify and work together and set aside differences, and yet in the general public instead are now starting to be driven apart. Regarding setting aside differences and coming together at the table, what are the gang members and prisoners "getting" that an increasing number of the RPG publishing industry and indeed the general population is missing?

How To Use Knowledge of Role-Playing Game Play Styles to Optimize the RPG Experience, Beware current popularity leading to increased "Balkanization": https://rpgresearch.com/how-to-use-knowledge-of-role-playing-game-play-styles-to-optimize-the-rpg-experience-(update)

I hope you found this overview helpful to further your interests. I am happy to speak with you further for any follow up questions you may have. If you would please keep us in the loop about what you find in your search, and consider sharing with us. We are a community driven organization and it is through everyone helping each other out and _sharing_ openly that we further the body of knowledge to the benefit of all.

Warm Regards,

-Hawke Robinson

Founder, Executive Director

RPG Research

www.rpgresearch.com

509.608.7630