Over more than two years, the ten partners of the URBACT Action Planning Network WELDI worked on addressing human rights challenges through their migrant reception and integration policies. Throughout this journey, the process of developing new policies—while juggling limited resources, convincing other city departments, and dealing with inevitable setbacks—often felt like playing a strategy game.
This experience inspired us to use that very format: a strategy game as a way to share key lessons learned through the WELDI project.
In Build a Welcoming City, players step into the role of policymakers tasked with making an imaginary city more welcoming. They introduce policies in areas such as employment, guidance or communication that are inspired by real examples from WELDI cities and beyond.
Along the way, players face realistic challenges and discover a key URBACT lesson: cooperation is key to effective local policies.
The game is designed to spark discussion on how cities can better protect and "localise" human rights. It works best with 3–5 players (or teams), takes at least one hour, and can be accompanied by a facilitator.
Download the ready-to-print game set below—and start building a welcoming city.
