Thursday, September 3, 2009

South Africa Simulation

(discussion of this game available on the Story Games for All forums).

TOWNSHIP REBELLION SIMULATION RULES

HOUSING: Unemployed workers must return to their Bantustans. There they may suffer from disease or starvation. The best solution is to find work in Johannesburg. If you can afford the rent, stay in Soweto. If you can't, stay at Crossroads. But remember: Crossroads is an illegal squatter settlement. The police may disperse it at any time.

FACTORIES AND MINES: Workers enter, sit at a chair, spend 1 energy token, and produce either 2 machinery or 1 diamond. No chair, no work. Chairs count as machinery, which must be replaced each year. Workers waiting for work should form a line leading to the factory or mine. After they work, they must return to their place of residence before getting back in line.

SABOTAGE: Some subversives are attempting to sabotage workplaces. To do this, they deposit a sabotage counter where their energy counter for work would go. That immediately destroys all machinery in the mine or factory, which must now be replaced by the owner. Needless to say, sabotage is illegal.

LAWS: As long as the government is in power, it may add or remove any laws it deems necessary. If the government is seen to be too soft on terrorism, or the economy starts to fail, other parties may start winning more seats in parliament. The government may ban any individual or organisation for subversive activities.

ROBBEN ISLAND: The police may throw people in jail, up to five at a time. They can be kept there for a few minutes (90 day law) or the government may make a good case (or new laws), in which they can be kept there as long as needed.

GUNS: Several parties in the game have access to guns. To use a gun, give it to the target. Tear the ticket in half. The target is now dead. They re-incarnate the following year. Roll a die. 1-2, Zulu. 3-4, Xhosa. 5, Tswana. 6, White (may be hired by police, government, or factory owners).

INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT: Every time the government commits an obvious injustice, international support falls. Significant reforms may make it rise (but irritate South African conservatives). If support falls too far, there may be some form of sanctions. Maintaining law and order is not in and of itself considered an injustice.

IMPORTS: Factory and mine owners have to import new machine parts each year. The store owner as to import foodstuffs (energy tokens). The costs are the following:
Machinery - 120 rand per chair, divided by the current strength of the rand. (So 24, 30, 40, 60, 120).
Food - 7 rand per token - current strength of the rand. (2, 3, 4, 5, 6).
If there is large-scale rioting or strikes, the rand will fall in value.

TIME: Each year lasts 5 minutes. The teacher will announce year changes.

For questions about the rules ask the teacher during the game.


Scenario: It is 1983. The National Party, under Prime Minister Botha, is desperately trying to hold the country together. The government must avert economic crisis, electoral defeat, and the revolution that is brewing in the townships and the countryside.

Timing:
Before class, arrange classroom with 3 Bantustans, Zimbabwe (no SA police allowed), Soweto, Crossroads, a mine, a factory, a store, a jail, and Johannesburg. Draw up all current variables on board.

Government support: 75% (lose 5% for every reform, 10% for every year in which businesses lose money)
International support: 7 (1-year boycott of SA goods at 5, investments withdrawn at 3, sanctions and a total shutdown of intl. trade at 1).
Strength of the rand: 5
Current legislation
Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act (1949)
Suppression of Communism Act (1950, bans subversive organisations)
Group Areas Act and Pass Laws (1950)
Immorality Amendment Act (1950)
Bantu Education Act (1953)
The Promotion of Bantu Self-Government Act (1959)
Internal security act (1976, bans public meetings)
Black Trade Unions are legal

10 minutes to explain rules.
-Everyone plays a role. Try to act in character. If you have any questions, ask the teacher.
-Please follow the rules on the first page. You may also refer to your textbooks at any time (unless the government bans them as subversive literature).
-The teacher may alter the rules at any point in the game due to unforeseen circumstances.
-NO actual violence, needless to say.
-I will act as moderator, international trader, and timekeeper. For the most part, the game is in students' hands.

30 minutes to play
-5 minutes per year. Spend your time ad-libbing mine shaft collapses and natural disasters.
-If game-play stalls, try a UN resolution, get harsh about international approval, start an economic crisis, or egg on the political organisers. If all else fails, have the Conservative party pick up 20% of parliament in 1987, or hand the SACP a huge arms cache (drop it off in Zimbabwe). The country should be in crisis by 85 or 86, and meltdown by 88. Stop the game in 1990.
-When in doubt, rule on the side of the apartheid regime. Enforce jailing and massacres (at a price in international support).

10 minutes to reflect
-How hard was it to govern the country?
-How hard was it to organise resistance?
-What did this simulation leave out?



Prime Minister Botha
Locale: Johannesburg
Objectives: Avoid electoral defeat, a collapse of the economy, and revolution. Preserve apartheid as long as possible.
Special powers: May ban any organisation. Controls the police. May introduce or revoke any law, as long as parliamentary majority holds out.

Agent for Anglo-American Diamond Company
Locale: Johannesburg
Objectives: Sell diamonds abroad as profitably as possible. Tackle strikes and demonstrations. If international support drops too far, however, the parent company will pull out its investments (80%).
Special powers: Runs the mine. May hire a worker to spend 1 energy token to mine 1 diamond. Every year, mine machinery will need to be maintained, requiring imports from abroad.

Agent for British Tractor Manufacturers
Locale: Johannesburg
Objectives: Hire workers to create farming equipment, which can be sold to other African states and western countries. If international support drops too far, however, the parent company will pull out its investments (80% rand).
Special powers: Runs the factory. May hire a worker to spend 1 energy token to produce 2 units for export. Every year, factory machinery will need to be maintained, requiring imports from abroad.

Landlord
Locale: Johannesburg
Objectives: Collect rent from the residents of Soweto. Sit back. Be rich. Mwa ha ha.
Special powers: Collect rent. Suggested start is 5 rand per year in Soweto (blacks only), and 50 rand per year in Johannesburg (whites only).

Minister of Police
Locale: Johannesburg
Objectives: Root out the communist, the agitator, the terrorist. The state must be secure.
Special powers: Controls the police. Has a giant supply of guns. To use a gun, present it to a target and tear the counter in half. Now they're dead. You may also arrest people and take them to jail. If need be, recruit spies among the Bantu, and distribute arms to factions in the movement to cause infighting. Remember to keep the blacks scared, in their place. Have police harass them, demand to see their papers constantly.

Policeman
Locale: Johannesburg
Objectives: Root out the communist, the agitator, the terrorist. The state must be secure.
Special powers: Supplied with guns. To use a gun, present it to a target and tear the counter in half. Now they're dead. You may also arrest people and take them to jail.





Policeman
Locale: Johannesburg
Objectives: Root out the communist, the agitator, the terrorist. The state must be secure.
Special powers: Supplied with guns. To use a gun, present it to a target and tear the counter in half. Now they're dead. You may also arrest people and take them to jail.

Bantu Nelson Mandela (Xhosa)
Locale: Robben Island
Objectives: Stay strong. Try to communicate with your supporters on the outside. If more of your comrades are thrown in jail, do your best to keep their spirits up. Be ready to negotiate with the Botha government, but not unless they agree to end apartheid!
Special powers: They wouldn't dare kill you.

ANZAPO Organiser
Locale: Soweto
Objectives: Organise black workers into the Azanian People's Organisation. Organise a rent strike! Ally with the trade unions and support a general strike in all industries. Overthrow the imperialist capitalist pig-dogs. Create a worker's state.
Special powers: Your identity is SECRET as you are a member of a BANNED organisation. Use these false papers to avoid attention from the police.

+

Bantu (Tswana)
Locale: Bophuthatswana Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Bantu (Xhosa), COSATU Organiser
Locale: In every mine and mill.
Objectives: Organise all workers in the mines and factories into Congress of South African Trade Unions. "To hell with politics, the strike is our weapon!"
Special powers: Strike! Strike! Strike! You are lucky that you can carry out your work openly, since black trade unions were legalised in 1980. The government wouldn't dare reverse that law... would they?

Bantu (Zulu)
Locale: KwaZulu Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short. Unless, of course, Chief Buthelezi figures out how to change things.
Special powers: You have the right to join the Inkatha Freedom Party.

Bantu (Zulu)
Locale: KwaZulu Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short. Unless, of course, Chief Buthelezi figures out how to change things.
Special powers: You have the right to join the Inkatha Freedom Party.

Chief Buthelezi
Locale: KwaZulu Bantustan
Objectives: Organise Zulus into the Inkatha Freedom Party. These ANC commie nutcases are going to ruin the country. You don't care about this "Black Consciousness" nonsense either. You are proud to be Zulu, and want the government to grant rights to the Zulu homeland. See if you can make a deal with the government. If they grant you a few concessions, it might be worth forming an agreement with them. Particularly if that agreement gets you the guns you need to raise up the Zulu Empire again. Remember Shaka!
Special powers: You are the Prime Minister of KwaZulu, under the Promotion of Bantu Self-Government Act. Your party is perfectly legal, as is your power.

ANC Organiser
Locale: Soweto
Objectives: Organise people into the ANC. Sabotage the racist apartheid regime. Bring forth a new democracy that provides for all its citizens. Use acts of civil disobedience (demonstrations and riots) and the sabotage of Umkhonto we Sizwe (Spear of the Nation) to make the country ungovernable, as Comrade Tambo has called for. ...Good luck.
Special powers: You have three sabotage counters. Distribute them to operatives who you can convince to join Umkhonto we Sizwe. To activate sabotage, alert the teacher (to enforce the rules), and then bring the sabotage counter to either the mine or factory. See if you can co-ordinate a mass attack on industry, perhaps followed by or just after a strike. In addition, your organisation is BANNED. Use these papers to fool the police:

+

Bantu (Xhosa)
Locale: Transkei Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Bantu (Zulu)
Locale: KwaZulu Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short. Unless, of course, Chief Buthelezi figures out how to change things.
Special powers: You have the right to join the Inkatha Freedom Party.

Bantu (Zulu)
Locale: KwaZulu Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short. Unless, of course, Chief Buthelezi figures out how to change things.
Special powers: You have the right to join the Inkatha Freedom Party.





SACP Organiser
Locale: Soweto
Objectives: Organise the working class into the South African Communist Party. Obtain arms from your Soviet allies and overthrow the capitalist imperialist government of South Africa. Create a Marxist-Leninist workers' state. Workers of the World Unite!
Special powers: You have a small cache of arms from the USSR. To use a gun, approach your target, present them with the ticket, and tear it in half. They are now dead. You may be able to get more guns. If you get well-organised, distribute these to the workers and prepare for the revolution... But beware! The SACP was the very first banned organisation. Keep your work a secret. Use these papers to fool the police.

+

Bantu (Xhosa)
Locale: Transkei Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Bantu (Zulu)
Locale: KwaZulu Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short. Unless, of course, Chief Buthelezi figures out how to change things.
Special powers: You have the right to join the Inkatha Freedom Party.

Bantu (Zulu)
Locale: KwaZulu Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short. Unless, of course, Chief Buthelezi figures out how to change things.
Special powers: You have the right to join the Inkatha Freedom Party.

Bantu (Xhosa)
Locale: Transkei Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Bantu (Xhosa)
Locale: Transkei Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Bantu (Tswana)
Locale: Bophuthatswana Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Bantu (Tswana)
Locale: Bophuthatswana Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Bantu (Tswana)
Locale: Bophuthatswana Bantustan
Objectives: Try to find work in Johannesburg. Soweto is miserable, but life in the Bantustans is brutal, miserable, and short.
Special powers: None. No rights either.

Shop Owner [This was actually played by my supervising teacher]
Locale: Soweto
Objectives: Buy energy tokens from abroad, sell them to black workers.
Special powers: Being white, you have the right to operate a store. You can hire shop assistants if you please.