After two days of strategic debate, the afternoon workshop shifted the focus from political framing to implementation. Participants worked on how to advance the Local Social Covenant as a shared political pact, exploring what it takes to translate principles into coordinated local action across diverse territorial contexts.
The workshop was structured around the Covenant’s eight pillars — housing, conflict prevention, climate justice, finance, food systems, public health, culture and the “new essentials” — with participants examining how these commitments can be operationalised through public service provision, community participation, public–community partnerships and collaborative governance. The emphasis was on moving from alignment around values to concrete pathways for delivery.
Across working groups, participants identified recurring constraints. Sustaining participatory processes over time remains difficult, particularly in contexts of limited technical and financial resources. Administrative fragmentation and rigid procedures were flagged as barriers to coordinated action. In several contexts, distrust between institutions and communities continues to undermine implementation, even where political commitments exist on paper.
At the same time, the workshop highlighted enabling conditions. Public– community partnerships were identified as a way to design more responsive and effective policies, particularly in areas such as care, housing and food systems. Participants stressed the importance of creating permanent spaces for dialogue, rather than one-off consultations, and of establishing clear rules of shared responsibility to avoid shifting burdens onto communities without corresponding support.
The discussion returned repeatedly to the idea of the Covenant as connective infrastructure. Its added value, participants argued, lies in linking capacities, leadership and resources around a shared vision of social transformation, rather than adding another layer of commitments. Where the Covenant is treated as a coordination framework, rather than a standalone programme, it is more likely to shape decisions that affect everyday life.
The message from the workshop was clear. Activating the Local Social Covenant is less about launching new declarations than about building the conditions for coordinated delivery. Turning political agreements into practice requires sustained collaboration across institutions and communities, with commitments reflected in decisions that directly impact people’s lives.
The workshop positioned the Local Social Covenant as a practical building block of the political roadmap towards the 2026 UCLG Congress in Tangier, where delivery and shared responsibility are expected to take centre stage.