"I believe gamification can strengthen democracies, by designing democratic participation to be accessible and to build consensus. The same game design ideas that have made video games the 21st century’s dominant form of entertainment — adaptive difficulty, responsive interfaces, progress indicators and multiplayer systems that encourage co-operative behaviour — can be harnessed in the service of democracies and civil society.

"Wildly popular — and very different — games like Mario Kart, Minecraft and Zelda all have one thing in common: they’re exquisitely designed to be enjoyed by as broad an audience as possible. That doesn’t mean they’re easy. It means they’re incredibly patient in giving beginners all the time and assistance they need to learn the skills required to learn the game and have fun. And they make the learning process itself fun, often eschewing tedious tutorials in favor of a simplified version of the game itself. They recognize and reward players for every bit of progress they make, and when players are ready to venture into multiplayer activities, they encourage good sportsmanship. While all of this effort is at least partly in pursuit of profit, there are clear lessons to be drawn about how to motivate users to engage with systems that could be applied for the greater good." - Adrian Hon

Article: How Game Design Principles Can Enhance Democracy