“It ended in disaster.” : Elements of dark design in the Organizational-Activity Games by G. P. Shchedrovitsky
Gerasimenko, Nadezhda (2025)
2025
Master's Programme in Game Studies
Informaatioteknologian ja viestinnän tiedekunta - Faculty of Information Technology and Communication Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2025-11-11
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-2025111010498
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-2025111010498
Tiivistelmä
The thesis is dedicated to the analysis of the Organizational-Activity Games (the OAGs) created by Georgy Shchedrovitsky in the 1970s. The OAGs were a sum of theoretical developments of the Moscow Methodological Circle (the MMC) – a group of Soviet philosophers who invented a theoretical framework to conceptualize collective intellection as action.
The aim of this thesis is to analyse the structure of the OAGs and to spot elements that could potentially be harming for the players’ psychological well-being. In the first chapter of the thesis available sources are discussed. The second chapter is dedicated to a brief overview of the history of the MMC. In the third chapter the way the OAGs were played is reconstructed. The following chapter deals with methodological theory on which the OAGs were based. In the last chapter an analysis is conducted, the main finding of which is that an OAG can be understood as a game form similar to live action role-playing games, with an exception that players of the OAGs were not supposed to understand that they were acting as characters during the process of play. At the end of the thesis opportunities for further research are discussed, the main of them being a proposal to conduct deep interviews with the former OAG players to learn about their actual experiences.
The aim of this thesis is to analyse the structure of the OAGs and to spot elements that could potentially be harming for the players’ psychological well-being. In the first chapter of the thesis available sources are discussed. The second chapter is dedicated to a brief overview of the history of the MMC. In the third chapter the way the OAGs were played is reconstructed. The following chapter deals with methodological theory on which the OAGs were based. In the last chapter an analysis is conducted, the main finding of which is that an OAG can be understood as a game form similar to live action role-playing games, with an exception that players of the OAGs were not supposed to understand that they were acting as characters during the process of play. At the end of the thesis opportunities for further research are discussed, the main of them being a proposal to conduct deep interviews with the former OAG players to learn about their actual experiences.