Gamification of backcasting for sustainability: The development of the gameful backcasting framework (GAMEBACK)

Georgina Guillen Mandujano; Jaco Quist; Juho Hamari

doi:10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.126609

Gamification of backcasting for sustainability: The development of the gameful backcasting framework (GAMEBACK)

Georgina Guillen Mandujano^*
, Jaco Quist
, Juho Hamari

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Scientific › peer-review

37 Citations (Scopus)

57 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Considering how wicked problems, such as overconsumption, climate change, or the management of the COVID-19 pandemic rely on multiple stakeholder groups’ deliberation, this study investigates gamification's potential in participatory backcasting processes to support the emergence and growth of social innovations towards sustainability. Gameful methodologies have progressively been introduced into strategic planning processes, futures research, and transition studies, offering a powerful input to participatory backcasting processes. As gamification is a novel and impactful way to motivate and engage participants to take action during and after the participatory process, this study develops a framework for practitioners to gamify backcasting processes. Developed through state-of-the-art review of extant corpus as well as two cases of gamified participatory backcasting, the framework elucidates how participatory backcasting processes that include gamification elements designed to address engagement do have an impact on the participants, particularly in terms of the process being a positive, co-creative experience, and offer a good foundation for posterior actions.

Original language	English
Article number	126609
Number of pages	16
Journal	Journal of Cleaner Production
Volume	302
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.126609
Publication status	Published - 15 Jun 2021
Publication type	A1 Journal article-refereed

Funding

the co –creation of the strategic Conditions for Sustainable Lifestyles - This case comprises a two-year-long project called “Budding Ideas Glocally for 2050″ that was financed by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The project kicked off at the United Nations Rio +20 summit in Brazil on June 20th, 2012. The backcasting processes took place in China, Colombia, Germany, Ghana and the Philippines between 2012 and 2013. This project had middle-class consumers as its target group. Its objectives were: (1) to identify key conditions that could support the strategic development of sustainable social innovations; (2) to encourage the development and uptake of existing social innovations (such as farm-to-fork initiatives) and sustainable business models (like upcycling and repurposing workshops); and, (3) to elaborate recommendations for international donor organizations to support the processes to lead more sustainable lifestyles in the countries of the study. Five “Strategic Conditions for Sustainable Lifestyles” (SCSL) were identified as they are consistent across all contexts, presenting a clear scope of action for different drivers of change to emerge. They help to crystalize situations, institutions, and even actors that would otherwise be perceived as too abstract or distant; moreover, they motivate participants to express autonomy, strengthen or build mastery within familiar contexts, which generates the necessary relatedness to craft visions that trigger innovative solutions. These conditions are: i) brand (design) sustainable living as an aspirational and affordable purpose; ii) decentralize decisions and actions and enable local empowerment via participatory governance; iii) make the business case for Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP); iv) build knowledge, capacity and skills for future consumers; and, v) facilitate transparency for trust-building. The conditions are far-reaching and flexible, allowing to systematically address societal well-being, environmental impacts, and economic prosperity. A more detailed account of the conditions and their creation process is summarized in the supplement and in Guillen-Hanson (2017) . To share the results with the participants and stimulate the follow up that backcasting calls for, the project created an online platform named the “Global Network on Sustainable Lifestyles (GNSL)" that featured gamification elements (voting and quizzes) for dialogue and knowledge exchange. The platform ( www.vision2050.net ) was online between 2012 and 2017. It had over 600 members worldwide. This research was kindly supported by the Fortum and Neste Foundation under the grant agreement 20200029 and the Academy of Finland Flagship Programme 337653 - Forest-Human-Machine Interplay (UNITE) . As the analyzed cases are part of larger, already ended projects, the authors would like to thank the participants (particularly the ones who provided their input 7 and 8 years later) and the teams behind the BIG2050-BISS projects, kindly funded by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development and executed by the corresponding author with the support of colleagues at the CSCP between 2012 and 2015. The authors would also like to thank MBA Lupita Guillen for her support illustrating the GAMEBACK framework.

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 7 Affordable and Clean Energy
SDG 13 Climate Action

Keywords

Gamification
Participatory backcasting
Social innovations
Sustainability
Sustainable lifestyles

Publication forum classification

Publication forum level 2

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment
General Environmental Science
Strategy and Management
Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Access to Document

10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.126609Licence: CC BY-NC-ND

Gamification of backcasting for sustainability 2021
CC BY-NC-ND
Final published version, 1.59 MBLicence: CC BY-NC-ND

http://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202105285533Licence: CC BY-NC-ND

Cite this

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title = "Gamification of backcasting for sustainability: The development of the gameful backcasting framework (GAMEBACK)",

abstract = "Considering how wicked problems, such as overconsumption, climate change, or the management of the COVID-19 pandemic rely on multiple stakeholder groups{\textquoteright} deliberation, this study investigates gamification's potential in participatory backcasting processes to support the emergence and growth of social innovations towards sustainability. Gameful methodologies have progressively been introduced into strategic planning processes, futures research, and transition studies, offering a powerful input to participatory backcasting processes. As gamification is a novel and impactful way to motivate and engage participants to take action during and after the participatory process, this study develops a framework for practitioners to gamify backcasting processes. Developed through state-of-the-art review of extant corpus as well as two cases of gamified participatory backcasting, the framework elucidates how participatory backcasting processes that include gamification elements designed to address engagement do have an impact on the participants, particularly in terms of the process being a positive, co-creative experience, and offer a good foundation for posterior actions.",

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Gamification of backcasting for sustainability: The development of the gameful backcasting framework (GAMEBACK)

Abstract

Funding

UN SDGs

Keywords

Publication forum classification

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Access to Document

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Cite this