Accessing the wellbeing commons: therapeutic resource-ification of natural and historic environments and social exclusion in the UK and Inner Asia

A hot spring in Sikkim, a mineral bath in Mongolia, and a wild swim in Devon all promise wellbeing—but who actually gets to use them, and who is left out? This project tackles a gap in how we understand social exclusion: the assumption that barriers to therapeutic environments are simply about race, class, or ethnicity. Instead, the researcher argues that exclusion is built into the very process of turning natural and historic “commons”—land, water, plants—into wellbeing resources. By comparing mineral springs and sanatoria in Mongolia, hot springs and medicinal pastures in Sikkim, and open-water swimming in Devon over five and a half years, the work will show how legal structures, political economy, and institutional rules create new inequalities even as they try to provide health benefits. If successful, this research could reshape how policymakers, conservation bodies, and health organisations design access to natural environments. Rather than assuming that opening a site to all is enough, planners might need to account for the deeper social and economic forces that quietly exclude people. The project is primarily conceptual and fundamental—it aims to change how we think about exclusion, not to produce a toolkit—but such shifts in understanding have historically informed more equitable public health and land-use policies.