Tamar Meshulam’s cooperative game Master Peace asks players to complete a circuit around a felt board by developing a collaborative story reflecting a noncompetitive, creative system of personal interaction. Moving through stations representing nexus points in social situations, participants use abstractly-marked pieces as stimuli for describing their shared journey.
The game mirrors the spirit and intent of the New Games movement (which some are now taking into the world of computer games): the belief that games can model and promote cooperative behavior and inspire participants to see their communities in new ways. The quasi-mystical, abstract, form resembles attempts to create playable games inspired by Hermann Hesse’s The Glass Bead Game.
Meshulam created the game as a way of nurturing dialogue withing communities plagued by violence and as a tool for inspiring more direct communications between cultural and ethnic groups. Based on its visual aesthetic and unique potential as a community-building tool, UNESCO’s Design 21 Social Design Network awarded the project first place in its Design Awards.
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. Historian Shae Davidson's research interests include public policy and the relationship between culture and civil society. His publications range from articles on industrial history to absurdist poetry.
