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Mission Impossible? Verisimilitude in EU Simulations

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Simulations of Decision-Making as Active Learning Tools

Part of the book series: Professional and Practice-based Learning ((PPBL,volume 22))

Abstract

Verisimilitude is a key feature of every simulation. After describing the key features and learning objectives of our simulations through a recent case study on EU negotiations, we explain how we strive to ensure verisimilitude, and we discuss the limits of our approach. From our experience, four elements in simulations of EU negotiations that aspire to verisimilitude are essential: reliance on original documentation and on the real procedural rules, the representation of non-institutional actors in the process, the availability of IT tools to allow near-real social media activities and the opportunity to exchange views with the actual negotiators during or at the end of the exercise.

Pierpaolo Settembri writes in a personal capacity and the views he expresses in this publication may not be in any circumstances regarded as stating an official position of the European Commission.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Or “illusion of reality”, as Keys and Wolfe (1990, p. 307) call it.

  2. 2.

    https://www.coleurope.eu/course/settembri-p-hermanin-c-worth-j-negotiation-and-decision-making-eu-simulation-game-50h

  3. 3.

    The reason for assigning different roles between the first and the second phase is explained in detail in the chapter on assessment.

  4. 4.

    The Treaty of Lisbon renamed it “ordinary legislative procedure”.

  5. 5.

    This has been done in various ways, also depending on the number of participants. For a simulation to include negotiations in the Council (or relevant preparatory body) and in the EP (or relevant committee), the minimum required number of participants is above 50.

  6. 6.

    A social media in all similar to Twitter except for its closed nature (i.e. only open to and visible by the participants). Its author, Jon Worth, explained the details here: https://jonworth.eu/teaching-eu-online-communication-through-simulation-the-twitcol-case/

  7. 7.

    In the example described by Scherpereel (2014, pp. 5–7), practitioners are not only involved to debrief students and provide a reality check. They codesign and co-manage the simulation game, thus injecting and ensuring verisimilitude to the whole exercise.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. European Commission, Brussels, Belgium

    Pierpaolo Settembri

  2. University of Trento, Trento, Italy

    Marco Brunazzo

Authors
  1. Pierpaolo Settembri
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  2. Marco Brunazzo
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Correspondence to Pierpaolo Settembri .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium

    Peter Bursens

  2. University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium

    Vincent Donche

  3. University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium

    David Gijbels

  4. University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium

    Pieter Spooren

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Settembri, P., Brunazzo, M. (2018). Mission Impossible? Verisimilitude in EU Simulations. In: Bursens, P., Donche, V., Gijbels, D., Spooren, P. (eds) Simulations of Decision-Making as Active Learning Tools. Professional and Practice-based Learning, vol 22. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74147-5_6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74147-5_6

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