Posted in News on Nov 17, 2025.
Today's inspiring and informative 'WIN Talks, From policy to practice: The Well-being of Future Generations Act in action', brought together the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, Derek Walker, Professor Martin Johnes, and Professor Luci Attala to explore how Wales is advancing the vision of the Well-being of Future Generations Act and how research communities can strengthen its impact.
Derek Walker, Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, opened the event with an overview of current priorities for implementing the Act, including long-term thinking, prevention, and system-wide collaboration. He illustrated how Wales is pioneering a global standard in governance by prioritising the wellbeing of its future generations. He highlighted the Act’s clear successes and proposed improvements to further enhance its effect.
He was followed by Professor Martin Johnes (Swansea University), who introduced Lles, a new AHRC-funded consortium of Welsh universities designed to embed the Act within higher education. The initiative will create 28 PhD studentships focused on wellbeing research, train emerging scholars in the Act’s principles, and place doctoral researchers within public bodies to directly contribute to organisational wellbeing goals. He highlighted Lles as a major step in aligning academic work with Wales’ national commitment to future generations.
Professor Luci Attala (UNESCO-MOST BRIDGES / UWTSD) discussed Wales’ global role, introducing the work of UNESCO-MOST BRIDGES, showing how BRIDGES is using humanities-led sustainability approaches which align with and amplify the Act internationally. Wales, despite being small, offers a visionary model, showing how legal frameworks can embed sustainability and future-focused governance. Luci suggests what the Act grasps and embodies, which is very special, is that sustainability isn’t just a technical or economic challenge, but deeply cultural and ethical. Luci highlighted projects such as REPAIR, a biophilic initiative in Swansea that reconnects communities with ecological wellbeing, and she emphasised how Wales is increasingly viewed as a “living laboratory” for innovative wellbeing governance. Luci highlighted that the Act is a model for the world and through it Wales demonstrates a powerful route towards more just, resilient, and future-focused societies. Read Luci's thought piece, 'What the World can learn from Wales', which expands on much of what she shared in today's WIN Talk, highlighting how Wales inspires international approaches to sustainability.
Together, the speakers demonstrated how Wales is driving forward a unique model of research-informed, future-oriented governance and how academic partnerships are helping to turn the Act’s ambitions into lived practice.
