About
Practice to Policy began with a question: Where do we begin?
For clinical psychologists wanting to make change beyond the therapy room, to have wider social impact there wasn’t a clear path. Practice to Policy started as an experiment in finding one.
Rooted in Dr Nina Browne’s doctoral research, Practice to Policy: Clinical Psychologists’ Experiences of Macrolevel Work (Browne et al., 2020), it brought together the lived realities of psychologists learning to influence systems and policy in messy, human ways. The research reminded us that real change happens through relationships, committed actions, and a willingness to take risks.
Nearly a decade on, Practice to Policy has become a home for that same spirit of experimentation. A vehicle for projects, innovation, research and collaboration that test new ways of approaching change.
The work keeps evolving, but the question remains:
Where do we begin? and how do we stay in relationship with change rather than collapsing under pressure.
being in relationship with change
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being in relationship with change 〰️
Nina is the Founder of Practice to Policy. But it’s been shaped by a long lineage of theories, practices and people that are committed to health equity and justice.
Nina’s career spans 25 years in the NHS and community sectors in the UK and Australia, working across mental health, housing, education and criminal justice systems. She has co-designed social impact initiatives in places where you’re least likely to find a psychologist — but most likely to find people with ideas and solutions to the complex social problems policy is trying to change. Over the past decade, her focus has been with young people most impacted by inequality. Those who are racialised, marginalised, or at risk of exclusion.
Her work with funders and policymakers continues to explore how relational approaches to social policy can shift power, build trust and enable lasting change.
Finally, she has pivoted away from talking and thinking to working with the body. To do this she has set up a new little sister called StudioP.