Why, What and How?
Why do we want you to play roles?
The most important and also the most experimental aspect of this course is role-playing. Rather than just talking about different perspectives and actors, we want you to bring these actors to life and see their perspectives from their individual point of view. This brings various new challenges and difficulties, but hopefully also fun and inspiration.
How will this work? What do you have to do?
The role play takes place via a digital conference tool (zoom) in the interactive slots 5, 7 and 8. Each role play includes several roles, e.g. social scientist, economist, and takes place during our interactive slot on Thursday from 10:15 to 11 (see U2D in 2020 for more information). Each role play consists of three phases:
Phase 1: Lecture “before” the role-play (e.g. lecture 1)
- The role play is based on the input of the previous lecture (e.g. Lecture 1) and is developed around a controversial question that is directly related to the perspective presented in this lecture.
- You will receive all necessary information about the upcoming role play: the roles involved and the question to be discussed in the role play during the interactive slot (here slot A).
- You will form 5 groups à three students that are permanent for the rest of the course. This group is your work and discussion unit for the three role-plays. We assign every group to a role (4 roles + 1 moderator) and will inform you about the distribution during the interactive slots.
Stage 2: The week before the role-play in upcoming interaction slot B:
- Define your role concretely. Some roles have different possible definitions. For example, a journalist could be a tabloid journalist or a science journalist. Discuss your options and decide on a definition.
- Read, read, read. Try to delve deeply into the world of your role.
- Find arguments for a reasonable position of your role in relation to the question of the upcoming role play. (We have selected questions that allow for controversial debates and contradictory positions). Prepare for the discussion in your role group.
- Decide who will be the main speaker in the upcoming discussion. The main speaker should address the key issues and summarize and summarize the position of your role. Because of the digital role play, the main speaker will also be more or less the only speaker. (Be aware that each of you must be the main speaker of a role group in a discussion at least once. Talk to each other so that each of you gets a fair share of the debates).
- If you are the moderator, think about interesting questions or a strategy to enrich or direct the discussions.
- Read through the Discussion_rules.
Stage 3: The actual role-play in interaction slot (here slot B)
- All students and some of the lecturers meet online at 10.15 am as in our regular interactive slots. All students must be present, but only the four main speakers and the moderator must have their picture and microphones activated. If someone else wants to make a statement, speaking time can be requested via chat. The moderator will give you speaking time and then you can turn on your microphone and picture.
- At the beginning of interaction slot B, the moderator introduces the question and starts the role play by asking each role group to answer the question. The debate develops around differences, similarities or other aspects. The point is to understand both, the different justifications as well as the unifying ideas.
- If one of your groups wants to write a blog entry about the role play, he or she should take notes about important aspects of the debate. You can also take photos or include other ideas in your documentation.
- After 15-30 minutes we stop the actual role play and give you about 10 minutes to reflect on your experiences, ideas and thoughts.
What can you do to take the most out of this experience?
- Understand, don’t act as if. You will get a lot more out of this if you really try to understand the arguments and perspective of your role. Aspects to consider are for example institutional settings, motivation, legitimation and working ethos. Don’t think or act in stereotypes. Bring the role to life by understanding its thinking and not by reproducing your understanding of that role.
- Communicate clearly and constructive. Always be helpful and open to new ideas.
- Don’t get frustrated. This is new for all of us. Things and plans will fail and others will succeed. We are all part of this learning process. Familiarize yourself with Zoom and be patient if the tools do not work as we hope.
- Ask questions!
- A role-play is a debate, not a fight. It is not about ‘right’ answers nor about finding any joint answer at all. It is about discussing and understanding uncertainty and about communication. The more you let go of the idea that not finding a joint answer is a failure, the more you will learn and enjoy role-playing.
- Have fun!
Example Roles
What roles are there?
There are various roles from natural scientist to lobbyist. Each role-play has particular roles depending on the question of the role-play. We will provide you with a description of the roles, involved in the upcoming role-play, in the preceding lecture.
Here, are a few examples of roles:
Role-play 1: “How certain are we that the global average near-surface air temperature has increased since 1850?„
- Mainstream climate scientists: expert in a climate-related field, agreeing with the majority of climate scientists about anthropogenic climate change
- Climate sceptic: expert in a climate-related or non-climate related field (e.g. researcher in theoretical physics) with a sceptical view on the anthropogenic nature of climate change and its evidences.
- Journalist: a person writing for newspapers (tabloid, science magazines,…) available (for free, on a blog, printed…) or collecting and processing information for (national, communal, public, private…) broadcast stations
- Politician: Decision-maker of a (right-wing, left-wing, neoliberal, conservative, communistic,…) party represented in a (communal, federal, national…) political entity
Role-play 2: “Question: „Considering the evolutionary potential in ecosystems and the related uncertainty, how should we decide on 2deg-related ecosystem management measures?“
- Natural scientist: expert in a natural science related to climate sciences with knowledge of biological processes and ecosystem dynamics
- Social scientist: expert in a social science coping with uncertainties within social systems and human behaviour as well as with the social dimensions of ecosystem services and management
- Economist: expert in economics dealing with economic values of ecosystems, conservation… believing in (liberal market economy, social market economy,…) and being paid by (oil-companies, research institutes, NGO’s…)
- Politician: Decision-maker of a (right-wing, left-wing, neoliberal, conservative, communistic,…) party represented in a (communal, federal, national…) political entity