Complex Costs: Tailor-made game to make complex problems discussable for VVSG
Food aid – and, by extension, policy – is not a problem that can be solved with a single good idea or a single policy document. It is a typical wicked problem (no problem definition, different logic, and every solution creates new tensions)
Local authorities, organisations, volunteers and users each see a part of the whole. No one sees everything.
That is precisely why traditional forms of consultation are becoming increasingly inadequate. We talk about each other, but rarely truly step into each other's reality.
VVSG (Association of Flemish Cities and Municipalities) therefore deliberately chose during the Food Aid Days to game.
Not as a gimmick.
Not as an icebreaker.
But as a methodology for complexity experiential to make.
Games force us to change our perspective. And that is not a luxury, but a necessity when dealing with wicked problems. This game, “Complexe Kost” (Complex Food), was developed in collaboration with Johanna Greis from University Centre Sint-Ignatius Antwerp and Steven Desair of VVSG. With the playful methods of mossels from brossels
A tailor-made game to facilitate discussion of complex issues
The game opens Food Aid Day and forms the basis for everything that follows. (Presentations, panel discussions, open space, etc.)
Participants temporarily step out of their professional roles and take on the role of a stakeholder within the food aid system.
The aim is not to come up with solutions or to “win”.
The objective is:
- build understanding,
- reveal tensions,
- and create a shared language for the rest of the day.
- complexity, making things “simpler”
The game is therefore not an end point, but a starting point.
Steven Desair
Staff member VVSG
Complex Cost: The game explanation in 4 steps
1 Empathy in one perspective
The 70 participants, actors in the food aid process (volunteers, local authorities, social grocery stores, etc.) are randomly seated at tables, each around one stakeholder. Through personas and context sheets, they experience: How does this perspective feel? Where is the problem?
2 Propositions and priorities
Three propositions are discussed and ranked at each table. Differences in opinion become apparent, without immediately being smoothed over.
3 Cross-pollination via fishbowl
Representatives of the different perspectives engage in dialogue. Empty chairs invite others to join in. Tensions are expressed, not avoided.
4 Harvesting and unrolling
Only then do participants let go of their roles. What did I feel? What do I understand differently now? What will I take away with me as myself?
What else?
The next Food Aid Day in Leuven Builds on Roeselare:
- more time for empathy,
- a stronger bridge to what's next,
- experts who participate rather than dominate,
- and concrete follow-up structures such as a pool of experts.
The game grows with you. It learns. It refines itself.
What it does in particular:
- deepen panel discussions,
- informal conversations change,
- and enable new connections.
Play does not provide ready-made solutions.
It does something more fundamental: it sets movement in progress.
And perhaps that is the crux of the matter:
Change does not start with consensus, but with contact.
With different perspectives. With discomfort. With shared responsibility.
Those who dare to engage with complexity create space for genuine change.
💡 Get something started with a game
Perhaps that is the greatest strength of this game design:
It recognises that change does not start with consensus, but with contact.
Contact:
- other perspectives,
- inconvenience,
- uncertainty,
- and shared responsibility.
Play creates space where words sometimes get stuck.
It slows down to deepen.
It connects without simplifying.
And that is precisely why this fits so well with the role that VVSG plays today: not as an all-knowing actor, but as facilitator of collective intelligence.
Food Aid Day is thus becoming more than just a study day.
It will be a starting point.
For other conversations.
Other collaborations.
Other actions.
Because one thing is clear:
Those who dare to engage with complexity set things in motion..
And movement is precisely what we need.
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