DUST General Assembly in Bulgaria
From 14–16 October 2025, we joined fellow partners of DUST in Sofia and Stara Zagora, Bulgaria, for the project’s final Consortium Meeting — a milestone event marking the transition from experimentation to reflection and dissemination. Hosted by the Center for the Study of Democracy (CSD) and Stara Zagora Regional Development Agency (SZ REDA), the meeting brought together project partners, Advisory Board members, and regional stakeholders to review findings from the Regional Futures Literacy Labs (RFLLs) and explore how the results can inform just sustainability transitions across Europe.
The meeting focused, during its first day, on the project’s central innovation: the Regional Futures Literacy Labs (RFLLs). An experimental, design-led framework that combined territorial research with citizen participation to give voice to least-engaged communities in policymaking.
The RFLLs, implemented in four European regions, tested hybrid participatory formats blending in-person workshops, digital tools, and design methods. After an overview of the results gathered from nearly 200 participants, each of the regional partners shared their citizen position papers, which summarised the outcomes of their local RFLLs and captured what communities value most in a just transition.
After discussions on the RFLLs and the advisory board members’ reactions to the project, the consortium shifted focus to the dissemination of results. Chaired by Samir Amin (iUE), this session explored how to ensure that DUST’s outcomes reach audiences across Europe – including policymakers at all levels, regional authorities, civil society, and academia. Partners discussed the need for a targeted strategy that present results clearly and concisely, from short policy messages and infographics to learning modules hosted through the DUST Academy.
During the second day, partners did a site visit in Stara Zagora and contributed to the public conference “30 Years Connecting the Dots – Stakeholders’ Policy Dialogue for the Future” at the Regional Library of Stara Zagora. The DUST exhibition was also proudly on display at the conference, with triptychs displaying visual representations of three types of futures in each of the DUST RFLL regions, and the citizen position papers providing in-depth inputs from each of the regions. iUE contributed to the design of these booklets, a valuable output that we were pleased to see attract interest among attendees.
As the consortium travelled back to Sofia on 16 October, discussions turned toward the future: synthesising the RFLL outcomes, creating policy recommendations, expanding the DUST Academy’s reach and creating dissemination spaces to share the wonderful results from the project.