Gaming Rhetoric and the Complicated Story of Local Identity

This chapter suggests that local communities do not frame or view decisions or the decision-making process through the lens of zero-sum games. In order to have a zero-sum game, there needs to be at least two distinct interests competing over the same scarce resource, typically pitted against each other, such as the economy and environment. While zero-sum games are often used to describe local conflicts (for example, bike lanes versus on-street surface parking), we believe there is far more at work in local governance. Zero-sum game explanations of local land use disputes dismiss and fail to account for the important connections communities have with the land and how those connections help form local decision-making and identity.