Created in 1966 by American sociologist William A. Gamson, SimSoc (Simulated Society) is an interactive societal simulation designed to study the dynamics of power, cooperation, conflict, and decision-making in a fictional community. This educational tool invites participants to manage a social microcosm, where they must deal with issues inspired by the functioning of modern societies: resource distribution, law enforcement, crisis management, and responding to inequality. Through this process, Gamson aimed to raise players’ awareness of the constraints and complexities of social systems while promoting a concrete understanding of sociological theories.
In SimSoc, participants are divided into subgroups representing different “regions” or segments of society. These groups must make collective decisions while navigating an environment where the rules of the game, available information, and resources are intentionally limited or unevenly distributed. This approach creates tensions and highlights social mechanisms such as competition, cooperation, and collective mobilization.
The SimSoc experiment took place in a historical context marked by the rise of role-playing games in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, while setting an eight-year precedent for what is often hastily referred to as the world’s first role-playing game: D&D, which, although entirely entertainment-oriented, nevertheless shares methodological similarities with SimSoc. Both are based on narrative immersion, collaborative problem-solving, and the exploration of ethical dilemmas or moral situations. However, unlike D&D, SimSoc incorporated explicitly educational and sociopolitical objectives in 1966. This was also the era of simulation games in academic and military circles, used to model complex situations such as geopolitical conflicts or governance issues.
Two social simulation games created by William A. Gamson followed in the footsteps of SimSoc, continuing to explore societal and social issues through the resolution of shared situations:
What’s News: A Game Simulation of TV News (1984), developed to raise participants’ awareness of the role of the media, puts players in the shoes of television news editors. They must choose which news stories to cover, balancing economic imperatives, public expectations, and political pressures. The goal is to reveal how media construction influences public opinion and the perception of events. Inspired by debates on journalistic objectivity and the commodification of information, “What’s News” illustrates how editorial decisions can exacerbate or mitigate inequalities in access to information.
Global Justice Game (2007), designed to address international issues such as climate change, poverty, and conflict, engages participants in roles as world leaders, NGOs, or multinational organizations. Each player pursues often conflicting objectives, illustrating the dilemmas of global governance. The game highlights the obstacles to international cooperation, including power disparities, conflicts of interest, and crises of confidence between actors.
The evolution of these social simulations is closely linked to the history of role-playing games and serious games. In the 1960s, America was undergoing a period of profound social change, marked by the civil rights movement, the Vietnam War, and rising Cold War tensions. Games such as SimSoc and military simulations responded to a need to model complex systems in order to better understand their interactions.
With the advent of role-playing games such as D&D, these playful tools have become more accessible and participatory, attracting a wider audience. However, games such as “What’s News” and the “Global Justice Game” have reintroduced an educational focus, highlighting the institutional and structural mechanisms that shape modern societies.
Today, for example, SimSoc’s influence can be seen in France in the practices of FibreTigre and its Game of Role games.
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