Metagame analysis involves framing a problem situation as a strategic

game A game is a structured type of play usually undertaken for entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator sports or video games) or art ...

in which participants try to realise their objectives by means of the options available to them. The subsequent meta-analysis of this game gives insight in possible strategies and their outcome.

Origin

Metagame theory was developed by Nigel Howard in the 1960s as a reconstruction of mathematical

game theory Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interactions. It has applications in many fields of social science, and is used extensively in economics, logic, systems science and computer science. Initially, game theory addressed ...

on a non-quantitative basis, hoping that it would thereby make more practical and intuitive sense . Metagame analysis reflects on a

problem Problem solving is the process of achieving a goal by overcoming obstacles, a frequent part of most activities. Problems in need of solutions range from simple personal tasks (e.g. how to turn on an appliance) to complex issues in business an ...

in terms of decision issues, and stakeholders who may exert different options to gain control over these issues. The analysis reveals what likely

scenario In the performing arts, a scenario (, ; ; from Italian , "that which is pinned to the scenery") is a synoptical collage of an event or series of actions and events. In the ''commedia dell'arte'', it was an outline of entrances, exits, and actio ...

s exist, and who has the power to control the course of events. The practical application of metagame theory is based on the analysis of options method, first applied to study problems like the strategic

arms race An arms race occurs when two or more groups compete in military superiority. It consists of a competition between two or more State (polity), states to have superior armed forces, concerning production of weapons, the growth of a military, and ...

and

nuclear proliferation Nuclear proliferation is the spread of nuclear weapons to additional countries, particularly those not recognized as List of states with nuclear weapons, nuclear-weapon states by the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, commonl ...

Method

Metagame analysis proceeds in three phases: analysis of options, scenario development, and scenario analysis.

Analysis of options

The first phase of analysis of options consists of the following four steps: #Structure the problem by identifying the issues to be decided. #Identify the stakeholders who control the issues, either directly or indirectly. #Make an inventory of policy options by means of which the stakeholders control the issues. #Determine the dependencies between the policy options. The dependencies between options should typically be formulated as "option X can only be implemented if option Y is also implemented", or "options Y and Z are mutually exclusive". The result is a

metagame A metagame, broadly defined as "a game beyond the game", typically refers to either of two concepts: a game which revolves around a core game; or the strategies and approaches to playing a game. A metagame can serve a broad range of purposes, a ...

model, which can then be analysed in different ways.

Scenario development

The possible outcomes of the game, based on the combination of options, are called

s. In theory, a game with N stakeholders s₁, ..., s_N who have Oi options (i = 1, ..., N), there are O₁×...×O_N possible outcomes. As the number of stakeholders and the number of the options they have increase, the number of scenarios will increase steeply due to a

combinatorial explosion In mathematics, a combinatorial explosion is the rapid growth of the complexity of a problem due to the way its combinatorics depends on input, constraints and bounds. Combinatorial explosion is sometimes used to justify the intractability of cert ...

. Conversely, the dependencies between options will reduce the number of scenarios, because they rule out those containing logically or physically impossible combinations of options. If the set of feasible scenarios is too large to be analysed in full, some combinations may be eliminated because the analyst judges them to be not worth considering. When doing so, the analyst should take care to preserve these particular types of scenarios : *The

Status Quo is a Latin phrase meaning the existing state of affairs, particularly with regard to social, economic, legal, environmental, political, religious, scientific or military issues. In the sociological sense, the ''status quo'' refers to the curren ...

, representing the future as it was previously expected. *The present scenario, which may differ from the Status Quo as it incorporates the intentions that are expressed by the stakeholders to change their plans; the Status Quo necessarily remains the same, but the present scenario may change as stakeholders interact and influence each other's plans. *The positions of different stakeholders, being the scenarios they would like others to agree to. Similar to the present scenario, positions may change through interaction. *

Compromise To compromise is to make a deal between different parties where each party gives up part of their demand. In arguments, compromise means finding agreement through communication, through a mutual acceptance of terms—often involving variations fr ...

s between two stakeholders, defined as scenarios that, while not the position of either, are preferred by both to the other's position. A compromise does not necessarily have to involve all stakeholders. *Conflict points, defined as scenarios that stakeholders might move to in trying to force others to accept their positions.

Scenario analysis

The next step in the metagame analysis consists of the actual analysis of the scenarios generated so far. This analysis centres around stability and is broken down in the following four steps : #Choose a particular scenario to analyse for stability. A scenario is stable if "each stakeholder expects to do its part and expects others to do theirs." Note that stable scenarios are accepted by all stakeholders, but that acceptance does not need to be voluntary. There may be more than one stable scenario, the stability of a scenario may change, and unstable scenarios can also happen. #Identify all unilateral improvements for stakeholders and subsets of stakeholders from the particular scenario. These are all the scenarios that are both preferred by all members of a certain subset and 'reachable' by them alone changing their selection of individual options. #Identify all sanctions that exist to deter the unilateral improvements. A sanction against an improvement is a possible reaction to an improvement by the stakeholders who were not involved in the improvement. It is such that the stakeholder who was involved in the improvement finds the sanction not preferred to the particular scenario, making it not worthwhile for that stakeholder to have helped with the improvement. The general "law of stability" to be used in scenario analysis is: for a scenario to be stable, it is necessary for each credible improvement to be deterred by a credible sanction
Steps 1 to 3 need to be repeated to analyse some additional scenarios. When a number of scenarios have been analysed, one can proceed to the next step: #Draw a strategic map, laying out all the threats and promises stakeholders can make to try to stabilise the situation at scenarios they prefer. Strategic maps are diagrams in which scenarios are shown by balloons, with arrows from one balloon to another representing unilateral improvements. Dotted arrows from improvement arrows to balloons represent sanctions by which the improvements may be deterred, thus changing the destination of the improvement arrow. This analysis procedure shows that the credibility of threats and promises (sanctions and improvements) is of importance in metagame analysis. A threat or promise, one that the stakeholder prefers to carry out for its own sake, is inherently credible. Sometimes a stakeholder may want to make credible an 'involuntary' threat or promise, to use this to move the situation in the desired direction. Such threats and promises can be made credible in three basic ways: preference change, irrationality, and deceit .

Development

Metagame analysis is still used as a technique in its own right. However it has been further developed in distinct ways as the basis of more recent approaches: * the graph model *

confrontation analysis Confrontation analysis (also known as dilemma analysis) is an operational analysis technique used to structure, understand, and analyze multi-party interactions, such as negotiations or conflicts. It serves as the mathematical foundation for ...

References

* * * * {{cite conference , last = Bots , first = P. W. G. , author2=Hermans, L. M. , title = Developing 'playable metagames' for participatory stakeholder analysis , book-title = Proceedings of the 34th Conference of the International Simulation and Gaming Association (ISAGA) , place = Chiba, Japan , year = 2003 , url = http://www.actoranalysis.com/documents/ISAGA2003.pdf , access-date = 2007-09-22 Game theory