Affiliations: [a] Delft University of Technology; Jaffalaan 5 2628BX
Delft, The Netherlands | City University of New York, College of Staten
Island | University of Massachusetts, Amherst | Universidad Autónoma del Estado de
México | University of Southern California – Information
Science Institute
Abstract: Improving public service delivery is a very complex domain and the
complexity is difficult to grasp by stakeholders having various degree of
knowledge and involvement. An emergent and promising method for dealing with
complex problems is simulation gaming, which can be used to capitalize the
intrinsic experiences and knowledge of people and mobilize their creativity to
come up with new solutions. A simulation game refers to a situation in which
human participants play a role and follow rules of play to simulate complex
situations. We developed a simulation game for the field of public-private
service delivery. The purpose of the game is to facilitate public organizations
to get to the core of problems in service delivery and to stimulate the
collaborative development of innovative solutions for public service delivery.
Playing the game at a municipality shows that the game is suitable for creating
awareness and for the identification and development of alternative solutions.
The game can be used to substitute the "authoritative-know-all" approach by a
"wisdom of the crowds" approach, incorporating the social collaboration that is
a key concept in Web 2.0 thinking.
Keywords: Public services, e-government, public-private cooperation, simulation, gaming, co-creation, collaboration
