1st and 2nd Wellbeing and Public Policy Conferences

 

This was the website for the 1st and 2nd Wellbeing and Public Policy conferences. Content is from the site's 2012 - 2014 archived pages.

Welcome!

Wellbeing and Public Policy (WaPP)is a major international conference to be held in Wellington, New Zealand on 13-15 June 2012. The purpose of the conference is to bring together policymakers and world experts to discuss recent advances in wellbeing research and the application of wellbeing research to policymaking at all levels of government.

With rising academic, public and political interest in wellbeing, more and more government officials are considering using wellbeing research to inform their policy decisions. This conference will promote interdisciplinary dialogue on how wellbeing research might best be applied to policymaking. Several interrelated issues will be addressed (these topics are described in more detail be:

 - What should the role of wellbeing and wellbeing research be in policymaking?
 - How should wellbeing be defined for research and policymaking?
 - How should wellbeing be measured for research and policymaking?
 - What role, if any, should subjective measures of wellbeing play in policymaking and national accounts?
 - What evidence is there on policies that improve wellbeing?

The third day of the conference will be dedicated to invitation only high-level workshops focused on specific topics, including:

 - Which measures of subjective wellbeing (if any) should feature in national accounts of wellbeing?
 - Poor but satisfied. Does subjective wellbeing have a place in addressing disadvantage?;
 - Gross National Happiness and other policy frameworks that look beyond the accumulation of wealth
 - How can research on subjective wellbeing actually inform policymaking?
 - Is there a mutualistic relationship between wellbeing and productivity?
 - How can we best measure the wellbeing of children?

Authors of the best papers from the conference (and a similar one in the UK the month after) will be invited to publish their paper in a special issue of the International Journal of Wellbeing (scheduled for mid 2012)..

Wellbeing and Public Policy is hosted by International Journal of Wellbeing in conjunction with Victoria University of Wellington and the Open Polytechnic of New Zealand.

Organisers: Philip Morrison, Dan Weijers, and Aaron Jarden

As an attendee of this conference, I can categorically say it was outstanding in its scope and presentations. I did miss about 15 minutes of one of the invitation only high-level workshops Is there a mutualistic relationship between wellbeing and productivity? due to an "emergency" phone call from one of my biggest clients claiming that the Salesforce customization was misconfigured with data leaking in from another account. They are completely dependent on Salesforce to handle many aspects of their customer relations programs, so this was considered an emergency. Fortunately, I was able to reach our cloud consultant for Salesforce Communities at home (it was after business hours in NYC) and he was able to assure & demonstrate to the client that there was actually no problem, just a user error in calling up the scripts. But this issue actually was germane to this event in that both the productivity and the wellbeing of the client were being negatively impacted due to a minor misunderstanding of the operating instructions. User issues can trigger some heavy duty stress if left unaddressed for too long. By the time I arrived home to Manhattan from New Zealand, all signs of stress had dissipated and life had returned to normal.


POSSIBLE CONFERENCE TOPICS
What should the role of wellbeing and wellbeing research be in policymaking?
 - Productivity, sustainability, and wellbeing – what should the government and the public sector be prioritising?
 - How to inform policymakers about measures of wellbeing and livings standards frameworks
 - How to enable and improve policymakers understanding and use of wellbeing research and livings standards frameworks
 - Should policymakers just use existing wellbeing research or actively encourage new research on specific topics? And what are the best ways to do this?
 -  What levels of government should use wellbeing research for policymaking and what are the difficulties of doing this at different levels of government?

How should wellbeing be defined for research and policymaking?
 - The limits of GDP: what else we want to know about to improve wellbeing
 - Should there be an overall/summary indicator index?: Pluralistic/Dashboard vs. monistic and hybrid approaches
 - What needs to be covered?: Capabilities, outcomes, mental, physical, material
 - Is one notion of wellbeing or one facet of wellbeing going to be used as a benchmark to assess the importance or inclusion of other notions and facets?
 - Who should be consulted on the definition of wellbeing?: Should this be an academic, policy/political, public, or hybrid issue?
 - The international coordination of the definition

How should wellbeing be measured for research and policymaking?
 - The testing and validation process in practice
 - The right questions: What they are and how to ask them
 - Census, household surveys, panel data: Who to ask and how to ask them
 - The international coordination of the measures
 - How to measure everyone’s wellbeing: Using subjective measures of wellbeing to assess children

What role, if any, should subjective measures of wellbeing play in policymaking and national accounts?
 - Strengths and weaknesses of subjective measures
 - Assessing the relative significance of subjective and objective measures of wellbeing for policymaking – which, if any, is more important?
 - What to do about subjective objective discrepancies
 - Should the government and policymakers change attitudes as well circumstances in the name of improving subjective wellbeing?

What evidence is there on policies that improve wellbeing?
 - Employment /inflation tradeoffs and their effect on wellbeing
 - Job security/production efficiency tradeoffs and their effect on wellbeing
 - The relationship between subjective wellbeing/engagement and production
 - Parental leave and wellbeing

Presenters

Keynotes:
 - Andrew Clark
 - Robert
 - Paul Frijters
 - Robert MacCulloch
In total, there were 47 presentations led by international or local experts at the conference and workshops.

Workshops

The workshops are invite only and will be held on Friday 15 June 2012. The high-level workshops focused on specific topics, possibly including:

1.;  Which measures of subjective wellbeing (if any) should feature in national accounts of wellbeing?
National accounts and wellbeing frameworks are being developed and reinvented in many countries. Most of these sets of indicators include subjective wellbeing, but there is little agreement about which measures are the best for this job and whether even the best measures are good enough. This workshop will investigate which measures of subjective wellbeing are conceptually and practically the most useful for measuring progress, or wellbeing in general, and the case for their inclusion in national accounts of wellbeing.

2.;  Poor but satisfied.  Does subjective wellbeing have a place in addressing disadvantage?
What should we make of data that indicate many people without enough income to meet their everyday needs are nonetheless quite satisfied with their lives? In order to best answer this question, this workshop will consider why large gaps can open up between various measures of wellbeing and if these gaps can be explained by different groups’ varied perceptions and drivers of wellbeing.

3.;  Gross National Happiness and other policy frameworks that look beyond the accumulation of wealth
Have the majority of national governments been looking at progress too narrowly? What can we learn about wellbeing and public policy from Bhutan and other policy frameworks that value social, environmental, and cultural capital as well as just physical and economic capital?

4.;  How can research on subjective wellbeing inform policymaking?
This workshop will include examples of how research on wellbeing has been successfully used to inform policymaking and discussion on the minimum requirements a subjective wellbeing study must meet in order to be useful for policymakers. The discussion will centre on several specific applications.

5.;  Wellbeing and productivity: A mutualistic relationship?
This workshop will investigate the relationship between various measures of wellbeing and productivity at work: Is a happier, more satisfied, or richer work force a more productive one? And does success at work in turn lead to increases in wellbeing? What consequences will a mutually reinforcing positive relationship between productivity and wellbeing have on growth?

6.;  Measuring the wellbeing of children: How and why? 
There is a widespread concern internationally over the distribution of state resources across the age groups and there have been numerous calls for a redistribution of funding towards children.; This in turn exposes the contrast between the many empirically validated measures of wellbeing for adults and the relatively few measures designed for and applied to children. This workshop will investigate the special challenges involved with measuring the wellbeing of children. The workshop will canvas several models and provide examples of successful studies in this area.

More Specifics on the Workshops

The workshops were held on Friday 15 June 2012 at Te Papa's TelstraClear Centre from 9:00 am to 5:0 0pm. 

The topics were:

1. The wellbeing framework of the New Zealand and Australian Treasuries (9:00 am - 12:00 noon) 
National accounts and wellbeing frameworks are being developed and reinvented in many countries, but there is little agreement about which measures are the best for this job and whether even the best measures are good enough. This workshop investigated which measures of  wellbeing are conceptually and practically the most useful for measuring progress, or wellbeing in general.

Chair: Vicky Robertson (Treasury)

Presenter 1: Girol Karacaoglu (NZ Treasury). Improving the living standards of New Zealanders: moving from a framework to implementation.

Commentator: Colin Lynch (Statistics New Zealand)

Presenter 1: James Kelly (Australian Treasury). The Australian Treasury’s Wellbeing Framework.

Commentator: Nick Carroll (NZ Treasury)


2. The wellbeing of children (9:00 am - 12:00 noon)
There is a widespread concern internationally over the distribution of state resources across the age groups and there have been numerous calls for a redistribution of funding towards children. This in turn exposes the contrast between the many empirically validated measures of wellbeing for adults and the relatively few measures designed for and applied to children. This workshop investigated the special challenges involved with measuring the wellbeing of children. This workshop canvassed several models and provided examples of successful studies in this area. 

Chair: Jonathan Boston (VUW)

Presenter 1: Simon Chapple (Secretariat to the Expert Advisory Group on ‘Solutions to child poverty’ of the Children’s Commissioner). Policy for enhancing child wellbeing in New Zealand.

Commentator: Joe Cribb (Children’s Commission)

Presenter 2: Paul Frijters (University of Queensland). Whatever happened to happy kids?

Commentator: Bronwyn Hayward (Canterbury University)


3. The wellbeing of low income households(1:00 pm - 3:00 pm);
What should we make of data that indicate many people without enough income to meet their everyday needs are nonetheless quite satisfied with their lives? In order to best answer this question, this workshop considered why large gaps can open up between various measures of wellbeing and if these gaps can be explained by different groups’ varied perceptions and drivers of wellbeing. 

Chair: Paul Brown (Statistics NZ)

Presenter 1: Philip Morrison (VUW) and Margreet Frieling (Statistics NZ). The subjective wellbeing of low income households.

Commentator: Brian Easton(Independent Scholar)

Presenter 2: Bryan Perry (Ministry of Social Development). The material wellbeing of low-income households.

Commentator: Kristie Carter (Otago University)


4. Gross National Happiness and other policy frameworks that look beyond the accumulation of wealth (1:00 pm - 3:00 pm)
Have the majority of national governments been looking at progress too narrowly? What can we learn about wellbeing and public policy from Bhutan and other policy frameworks that value social, environmental, and cultural capital as well as just physical and economic capital? 

Chair: Ralph Chapman (VUW) 

Presenter 1: Michael S. Givel (The University of Oklahoma). Gross National Happiness in Bhutan: policy outputs and outcomes from 2009-2011.

Presenter 2: Katherine Trebeck (UK Poverty reduction, OXFAM) and Gehan MacLeod (Galgael Trust). The Oxfam Humankind Index.

Presenter 3: Yoshiaki Takahashi (Japan International Cooperation Agency). Japan’s wellbeing index: concept, framework and a public policy tool.

5.  How can research on subjective wellbeing inform policymaking?  (3:30 pm - 5:00 pm);
This workshop included examples of how research on wellbeing has been and could be successfully used to inform policymaking and discussion on the minimum requirements a subjective wellbeing study must meet in order to be useful for policymakers. The discussion centred on several specific applications. 

Chair: Amanda Wolf (VUW)

Presenter: Robert Cummins (Deakin University). Measuring subjective wellbeing to inform public policy. 
Commentator: Arthur Grimes (Motu: Economic and Public Policy Research)

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2014 International Wellbeing and Public Policy Conference

June 10-12, 2014
Hamilton College, Clinton, NY

The International Journal of Wellbeingis pleased to announce the second International Wellbeing and Public Policy Conference, to be held June 10-12, 2014 on the campus of Hamilton College in scenic upstate New York. This conference follows on from the inaugural conference held June 12-15, 2012 in Wellington, New Zealand. Keynote speakers for the 2014 conference include prominent wellbeing scholars Carol Graham, John Helliwell, Andrew Oswald, Arthur Stone and via skype Ruut Veenhoven.

Programme

Keynote speakers for the 2014 conference include prominent wellbeing scholars:

  • Andrew Oswald
  • John Helliwell
  • Arthur Stone
  • Ruut Veenhoven  

with others to be announced at a later date.

 

More Background On WellBeingAndPublicPolicy.org

 

WellBeingAndPublicPolicy.org served as the official online home for the 1st and 2nd Wellbeing and Public Policy Conferences, two major international gatherings that brought together scholars, policymakers, researchers, and public-sector leaders to explore how wellbeing research can meaningfully inform governance. The site’s content—now archival—preserves program details, thematic areas, keynotes, workshop sessions, organising teams, and the intellectual foundations of a movement dedicated to advancing wellbeing as a core dimension of public policy.

The conferences represented a pivotal moment in the global shift toward integrating subjective wellbeing, living-standards frameworks, child wellbeing measurement, low-income household wellbeing, and alternatives to GDP into national and regional policy design. The website functioned as a curated hub that framed these discussions, documented the agenda, and showcased the diversity of international expertise convened through the events.

Purpose and Mission of the Site

The central mission of WellBeingAndPublicPolicy.org was to provide a digital hub for conference information and to promote interdisciplinary dialogue on a fundamental set of questions:

  • What role should wellbeing research play in policymaking?

  • How should wellbeing be defined and measured?

  • Which subjective wellbeing measures—if any—deserve a place in national accounts?

  • What evidence exists for policies that actually improve wellbeing?

These questions formed the backbone of the conference programming. The website collected and organised the materials outlining these themes, giving potential attendees, researchers, and policymakers a structured way to engage with the rapidly developing wellbeing-oriented policy domain.

Ownership and Hosting

The inaugural 2012 conference—and therefore the associated website—was organised and hosted by:

  • International Journal of Wellbeing

  • Victoria University of Wellington

  • The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand

The organising team—Philip Morrison, Dan Weijers, and Aaron Jarden—served as the intellectual and administrative leadership for the first conference. Their academic backgrounds in wellbeing research shaped the site’s priorities, content, and framing.

By the 2014 conference cycle, the event was hosted at Hamilton College in upstate New York. Although the location and hosting institution changed, the same core commitment to wellbeing-driven policy innovation remained central to the site’s identity.

Conference History Preserved on the Site

2012: Wellington, New Zealand

The first Wellbeing and Public Policy Conference was held 13–15 June 2012 in Wellington. This event focused on major emerging insights from wellbeing research and emphasised how such findings could be translated into actionable government policy at all levels.

The program included:

  • Full conference sessions

  • High-level, invitation-only workshops

  • 47 presentations from international and local experts

  • A special issue invitation for selected papers to be published in the International Journal of Wellbeing

The website preserves all major conference themes, workshop descriptions, keynotes, and structural content from this landmark gathering.

2014: Clinton, NY (Hamilton College)

The second conference took place 10–12 June 2014, expanding the community beyond Australasia and strengthening the global scholarly network. Distinguished keynote speakers included several of the world’s most prominent wellbeing scholars.

The website’s archival snapshot reflects the community’s maturation and growing momentum—demonstrating that the initial Wellington conference sparked an international continuity of wellbeing-policy integration.

Key Themes Featured on the Site

WellBeingAndPublicPolicy.org dedicated substantial space to outlining the major topics explored at the conferences. These themes define the policy-research frontier of wellbeing:

1. The Role of Wellbeing in Policymaking

Discussions centered on sustainable development, productivity, inequality, and the practical challenges of bringing wellbeing frameworks into different levels of government (local, regional, national).

2. Defining Wellbeing

The site emphasised a critical question: Should policymakers and researchers rely on a single summary indicator (e.g., a wellbeing index), or adopt a pluralistic, “dashboard-style” approach?
It also explored:

  • The limits of GDP

  • Capabilities approaches

  • Mental, physical, material wellbeing dimensions

  • Public vs. political vs. academic input

3. Measuring Wellbeing

One of the most technically detailed sections of the site covered how to select and test wellbeing measures, including:

  • Which questions to ask

  • How to administer large-scale surveys

  • How to ensure international coordination

  • How to measure children's wellbeing (a noted global gap)

4. Subjective Wellbeing in National Accounts

The workshop descriptions preserved on the site demonstrate deep debates about:

  • Strengths and weaknesses of subjective metrics

  • Reconciling objective vs. subjective discrepancies

  • Whether governments should modify circumstances, attitudes, or both

5. Evidence-Based Policy Design for Wellbeing

The site highlights research on:

  • Employment/inflation tradeoffs

  • Productivity vs. job security

  • Relationships between engagement and workplace wellbeing

  • Parental leave

  • Low-income household wellbeing

High-Level Workshops Documented on the Site

The website contains detailed descriptions of six high-level workshops from the 2012 conference, which stand out as some of its most distinctive and valuable content. These workshops were invitation-only, signifying their high academic prestige.

1. Measures of Subjective Wellbeing for National Accounts

Participants debated which subjective measures are conceptually sound for use in national progress indicators.

2. Wellbeing of Children

This workshop explored the severe imbalance between the availability of adult wellbeing metrics and the scarcity of child-specific ones.

3. Wellbeing of Low-Income Households

Researchers examined surprising findings—for example, individuals facing economic hardship who still report relatively high life satisfaction—and investigated psychological, cultural, and situational drivers.

4. Gross National Happiness and Beyond-GDP Frameworks

This session presented international models such as Bhutan’s GNH, the Oxfam Humankind Index, and Japan’s wellbeing frameworks as alternatives to wealth-centric policy measures.

5. Using Subjective Wellbeing to Inform Policymaking

The workshop provided practical examples of successful policy applications of subjective wellbeing research.

6. Wellbeing and Productivity (Mutualistic Relationship)

Speakers evaluated whether happier workers are more productive—and whether greater productivity enhances wellbeing in return.

Keynote Speakers Highlighted on the Site

Among the distinguished keynote speakers:

  • Andrew Clark

  • Robert MacCulloch

  • Paul Frijters

  • Robert Cummins

  • John Helliwell

  • Arthur Stone

  • Ruut Veenhoven

The presence of these scholars underscores the intellectual heft and global reputation of the events documented on the site.

Audience and User Demographics

The site and the conferences appealed primarily to:

  • Academic researchers

  • Economists and social scientists

  • Public policymakers

  • Government ministries

  • Public-health professionals

  • Welfare and social development agencies

  • Think-tank researchers

  • Students of public policy and wellbeing science

Because wellbeing policy sits at the intersection of economics, psychology, and sociology, the audience base was highly interdisciplinary. The site’s language and structure reflected this, offering material comprehensible to policymakers but grounded in rigorous research.

Cultural and Social Significance

WellBeingAndPublicPolicy.org holds a unique place in the historical movement toward incorporating wellbeing as a governmental priority. Key contributions include:

1. Elevating Wellbeing in Global Policy Dialogue

Long before wellbeing indices became mainstream in OECD and national governance conversations, this site and its conferences provided an academic-policy foundation for such integration.

2. Promoting Non-GDP Measures

The site helped legitimize global conversations around “beyond GDP” frameworks, aligning with later international efforts by governments and multilateral institutions.

3. Building Early Bridges Between Scholars and Policymakers

The conference design—especially the invitation-only workshops—served as early models of structured policy engagement with wellbeing researchers.

4. Creating an Archive of Early 2010s Wellbeing Thought Leadership

The site effectively preserves an intellectual snapshot of a period when wellbeing research was transitioning from academic debate to practical governance.

Site Structure (“Menu”) and User Experience

The website—archival now—presented:

  • Conference overviews

  • Detailed program schedules

  • Workshop topics and descriptions

  • Presenter and keynote lists

  • Organiser information

  • Venue and logistical information

  • Background context on wellbeing and policy

  • Calls for papers

  • Links to post-conference publications (described but no longer active)

The structure was practical, academic, and designed for conference participants rather than for general public browsing.

Public Reception and Legacy

Though the site does not display “reviews” in the conventional sense, it does contain a first-person account highlighting the conference’s high quality, noting it as “outstanding in its scope and presentations.” This anecdotal reflection underscores the conference’s professional impact and the calibre of the assembled community.

The legacy of the conferences—preserved on the Site—shaped wellbeing-policy thinking throughout the 2010s, influencing subsequent research, governmental wellbeing budgets, and international wellbeing frameworks.

WellBeingAndPublicPolicy.org is an important archival portal documenting two formative conferences that shaped the wellbeing-policy landscape. Its content offers rare insight into how early researchers and policymakers grappled with defining, measuring, and applying wellbeing in governance. The Site continues to be a valuable reference for historians of public policy, wellbeing researchers, and scholars examining the evolution of alternative metrics beyond GDP.

The archived material stands as a testament to a period when wellbeing science rapidly matured and governments worldwide began turning toward frameworks that consider prosperity, happiness, health, social capital, and life satisfaction as essential components of progress.

WellBeingAndPublicPolicy.org