Red Cross Blogs

Students decide the rules of war in Paxium

By Victoria Watts
March 6, 2010 at 2:00 pm

On Wednesday, I read an article in the Guardian in praise of educational games, and I couldn’t agree more. In fact, last week I discovered one of the best ones yet when I, along with 92 secondary students, took a trip to the fictional world of Paxium to debate its rules of war.

You can read the news story for a bit more on the background about why it all took place, but here’s what happened. Secondary students from across the country went to the offices of law firm Allen and Overy in London to role-play the negotiations for the rules of a civil war.

When I arrived, they’d been split into groups of about 20 and were designing a flag and coat of arms for Paxium. Then, suddenly, a screen dropped down in each room and a ‘live’ broadcast announced that fierce fighting had broken out in the country – the groups were divided in two and students found themselves as either a member of President Solon’s government or General Granesta’s rebel army.

I stayed in a room with the government side. Each student was given a piece of paper detailing their new ‘identity’ such as president, medical officer or weapons manufacturer.  The paper told them who they were, what they believed, whom they needed to get on their side, and what their hidden agenda was.

As the activity unfolded, the students were encouraged to stay in character and debate the rules of war. President Solon made a series of speeches with ‘news’ from the field introducing discussion about things like the treatment of civilians and prisoners, and the use of child soldiers and landmines.

It was fantastic to watch. At first the students were a little unsure of themselves but quickly got into character and entered a heated debate. “Kill them all”, shouted the army commander, “two wrongs do not make a right”, cried the supreme court judge, “you can take the moral high ground but we won’t win the war”, warned the president’s chief of staff. There was a clear divide between those who favoured violence and those who were more humane. It looked so fun I had to stop myself from joining in!

In the end, diplomacy won and the rules were decided by vote, with the non-violent side coming out tops.

Next step – the negotaiation room. Both the government and rebel side entered in hyped-up  for an argument, but quickly found they had similar ideas – torture would be prohibited, NGOs allowed access, child soldiers not allowed (but treated as adults if they were), and prisoners made to work if fit to do so, and so on. It became clear that the news stories they’d received had fed false information – something neither side had thought to consider.

Finally there was a de-brief, which is the part I found most fascinating. The amount the students got out of the activity was fantastic. I heard people say: “It showed how it’s not just one side against another – there are also lot of conflicts within that side.” “It was so hard to find a solution that didn’t conflict with moral values.” “Both sides thought they were the good guys. We didn’t think about the news being false.” “It would be even more complicated if the war was between religious or ethnic groups.” “More people should definitely be taught this kind of thing.”

This kind of discussion and learning is invaluable. There are so many of us who don’t spare a thought for such issues and I was so impressed to see these things taught in such an interactive and fun way, and even more impressed by the students’ reaction to it. So yes, I agree wholeheartedly with Naomi Alderman in the Guardian – educational games are most definitely brilliant!

Find out more about the British Red Cross partnership with Allen and Overy and download the new educational resource.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, March 6th, 2010 at 2:00 pm and is filed under Fundraising and events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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