[Book Review] #futuregen : lessons from a small country

Abstract

In #futuregen: Lessons from a small country, Jane Davidson charts Wales’ journey from devolution in 1999 to becoming the first country in the world to formally enshrine the rights of future generations in law via the Well-being of Future Generations Act (2015). Davidson, herself a central figure in the Act’s development and former Minister for Environment, Sustainability and Housing in Wales (2007-2011), sets out to explain why the country pursued this reform, how it fared along its journey, and what can be learned from the lived experience of a small nation attempting to innovate. The ambition of the book, tying these points together, is to assess whether the concept of a “legal ‘golden thread’ of intergenerational fairness” (p. 22) can positively reframe a country’s approach to the major problems of our time, and to evaluate how successful Wales has been in reorganising itself around the central principle and pursuit of sustainable development over the last 20 years.