The Strategic Game ‚Stratagem’ by Dennis Meadows as method to reflect the SDGs in student’s education

Christian Baumgartner, response & ability gmbh

Background:
In the 1990s, Dennis Meadows, author of ‘Limits of Growth’, developed the simulation game ‘Stratagem’ on a computer-aided board, which simulates the — more or less — sustainable development of an emerging country. The maximum 10 players act as ministers and have 10 legislative periods to develop the country into a sustainable direction.

The key points of the decisions are energy and goods production, food production, energy efficiency, environmental protection as well as health and education. The country can export and import and borrow credits from the World Bank.

The respective decisions are entered into a computer program, which produces scientifically based results for a series of social, economic and ecological indicators, which in turn form the basis for the next government discussions and decisions.

The simulation game can — much better than any theoretical lecture — convey a number of topics and challenges of sustainable development, and goals of the SDGs, through direct experience in a very compact form.

Lead Presenter
Hon. Prof. (FH) Dr. Christian Baumgartner studied landscape ecology and is owner and CEO of response & ability (www.responseandability.com).

In 1995, he founded respect - Institute for Integrative Tourism and Development (www.respect.at) and was later for a decade Secretary General of Naturefriends International. Besides his work as lecturer for Sustainable Tourism, Ethical Management, a.o. in Vienna, Krems (A), Siders and Chur (CH), Belgrade (Serbia), Baku (Azerbaijan) and China he was member of the (former) Tourism Sustainability Group within the EU Commission, DG enterprise, and the Multi-Stakeholder Advisory Committee (MAC) of the UNEP 10YFP Sustainable Tourism Programme and member in several more national and international tourism related advisory boards.

Christian Baumgartner is specialized in development and implementation of sustainable tourism and sustainable regional development and guided several concrete tourism development projects in Europe and south-east Asia. Actually he is very engaged in the sustainable tourism development of the middle and lower Danube, including the Danube Delta and tourism development in Central Asia (Kyrgyzstan). He is board member of the Danube Competence Centre in Belgrade / Serbia and vice-president of the International Commission for the Protection of the Alps (CIPRA).

Furthermore, Christian Baumgartner has vast experience in labelling and monitoring. He is part of the advisory boards of the Austrian and the European eco-labels for tourism accommodation, member of the certification board of TourCert (www.tourcert.org) and published books on assessment of sustainability in tourism.