At BG | berlinergazette.de’s 2025 conference, Pluriverse of Peace, the workshop “World Game” gathered to explore how a game might enable “anti-war and climate activists to explore commonalities and bridge differences.”
Accordingly, for 2.5 days we met and considered the following questions:
- What role do games play in movements for peace and ecology?
- What are the key tensions, questions, and contradictions that separate anti-war and climate movements?
- What sorts of games are being played at the conference, and how could we design a game to fit naturally into that intellectual ecosystem?
- What is it that games can do for a group that is unique, that texts or speeches or other forms of engagement cannot provide?
Although the anti-war and climate movements are serious, our group discussed the importance of games and play in creating inviting spaces and times for people to come together. Games help us explore models of agency within complex systems and teach us new ways to cooperate, even when competing in a good-natured manner.
Accordingly, the team experimented with and developed several game prototypes. These ranged from conventional board games to participatory and theatrical games. All of these games aimed to provoke deeper and more meaningful discussions and experiences.
As we were preparing our games, we became aware of the local situation outlined below.
We changed the focus of our workshop to explore the possibility of using gamified techniques for a solidarity action.
In response to the situation, the World Game team organized a game-like, interactive solidarity action at the Pluriverse of Peace conference hosted by BG | berlinergazette.de.
After reading the statement below, the World Game working group led a procession of participants carrying their chairs to the site where the statue had been removed.
There, the participants played a short conversational game.
- They placed their chairs side-by-side (emulating the removed statue)
- They were asked to discuss what the removal of the statue from the street could reveal about the commonality and potential solidarity of anti-war and climate activists.
- Members of the local community were invited to swap places with conference participants and continue the conversation with their seated partner.
Early on the morning of Friday, October 17, 25 Berlin police acted on a judge’s orders to remove “Ari,” a statue commemorating the resilience of so-called “Comfort Women,” which had stood for five years near the ZKU in Moabit.
The statue had been created and installed with the support of the Korea Verband and with the official permission of Berlin authorities. It honours the memory of the more than 200,000 Korean women who were enslaved by the invading Japanese army during the Second World War and who suffered horrific sexual and other abuses. It is a replica of a statue first installed in South Korea in 2011, and then subsequently in cities around the world.
That statue featured two chairs: in one, a Korean survivor of the enslavement sat peacefully, with her hands in her lap; the other was empty, inviting the audience to sit with her and reflect on questions of peace, war, solidarity, history, memory, and power.
The memorial was a rallying-point for Berlin’s Korean community, as well as for other peace and gender justice activists in the city.
On Thursday, October 16, the Berlin judge in the case had ordered the removal of Ari citing the argument that it was only ever intended to be a temporary piece of public art, not a permanent memorial, and suggesting that the statue may be moved to a new location in the future.
However, activists have evidence showing that lobbyists for the Japanese government pressured German and Berlin officials to remove the statue, which the government has opposed for a long time. For many years, the far right in Japan has mobilized around efforts to silence the story of the enslaved Korean women, which they argue insults Japan.
Berlin activists supporting the statue have provided evidence that the Berlin and German authorities were likely influenced by the desire to strengthen corporate ties with Japan, including lucrative contracts with Mitsubishi for power infrastructure in Berlin. The activists suspect that the statue was removed to grease the wheels of these business deals.
We propose that this story is deeply linked to the key themes investigated at the Pluriverse of Peace conference hosted by Berliner Gazette.
Removing a statue dedicated to peace only serves the interests of Japanese and German capitalists and their governments, not the people of Berlin, Korea, Japan, or anywhere else.
This act is an attack on peace and international solidarity movements.
At a time when we need to remember these links the most, it erases the history of gender violence and fascism.
Japanese fascists viewed Korea, its people, and its women as resources to be exploited and discarded. Similarly, today’s imperial and corporate regimes see people and the planet as objects to be used for profit.
Removing the statue undermines the city’s civic and democratic infrastructure. In the name of profit and imperialism, it erases spaces for discussion, debate, solidarity, and community. While opponents of the statue claim it may lead to anti-Japanese sentiment, this argument is cynical and opportunistic. In fact, acknowledging historical atrocities, such as the enslavement of Korean women, strengthens our capacity for solidarity. This is precisely why Berlin is filled with memorials commemorating the crimes of the National Socialists, although sadly, there are still no memorials dedicated to the evils of German colonialism. Furthermore, erasing this history encourages Japanese neofascists, who view it as a victory.
The removal of the statue is part of a broader trend in Berlin, Germany, and around the world to transform our cities into sites for capital extraction rather than community building, solidarity, peace, and transformation. This comes after two years of brutal repression of the Palestine solidarity movement, at a time when Germany and the rest of Europe are preparing to sacrifice the public good to fund war and its profiteers.
For these reasons, some of us who participated in the Berliner Gazette’s Pluriverse of Peace conference are taking action in solidarity with Berlin’s peace-loving communities who want the police to return the statue. We are artists, intellectuals, activists, journalists, and other concerned individuals from over 25 countries who have come together to discuss and work towards peace and justice. We seek not only an absence of war, but also equality, solidarity, democracy, and freedom. In this context, we strive for a new and better relationship with the environment, of which we are a part.
Restore the statue. Commemorate resistance. Peace for the Pluriverse.
Video Recordings from Oct. 18 2025
The ‘World Game’ workshop was facilitated by Max Haiven. Particpants were: Alistair Alexander, Laura Burtan, Valentin Cernat, Alina Floroi, Lotte Herzberg, Jens Isensee, Inga Lindarenka, Gracie Matu, Mădălina Musca, Vitalie Sprînceană.
This project was conceived at the Pluriverse of Peace conference by BG | berlinergazette.de.
All text and images: Creative Commons License CC BY 4.0.