Family support networks and population ageing

Aimed to discuss the nascent body of research on intergenerational transfers with a specific focus on those societies newly arrived to the modern world of aging.

While the literature on intergenerational transfers in societies in the very late stages of a demographic transition is voluminous and growing at the same pace as the pressures they face from the aging tide, the same is not true in societies where fertility rates declined to low levels only recently. And yet, because of the demographic nature of the process of aging throughout these societies-compressed in a fraction of the time it took in more advanced societies and under precarious economic conditions and fragile institutional contexts – the issue of support for the elderly is being felt on a larger scale and the problems that it generates are becoming more urgent.

As a result of a seminar held in Qatar during June of 2009, a volume was created an attempt to identify the more salient issues related to elderly support facing societies where aging is occurring much more suddenly that in North America and Europe. Some of these problems are common to all societies experiencing aging and some peculiar to those that have joined the low fertility level group only recently. The volume attempted to cover a wide ranging set of issues, from those purely demographic involving hard constraints on kin availability to those involving transfer rules rooted in cultural norms. The effect of the changing institutional context – macroeconomic performance, state policies and the operation of private markets – creates a large canvass within which the resource availability for the elderly are negotiated and allocated. The elderly’s fortune or misfortune will be decided and settled within a complex ground where new ideologies, new fertility regimes, new morbidity and mortality patterns as well as a new balance between private markets and state based interventions, will seek mutual accommodation not without frictions nor conflicts both within the family and in the larger public arena.

Background materials

• Agenda
• A Summary Statement by Alberto Palloni
• List of Participants

Papers

• Family Support Networks and Population Ageing
  by Alberto Palloni, Guido Pinto and Rebeca Wong
• Government Policies Supporting Family Networks: Best Practices From The Policy Area Of Ageing
  by Alexandre Sidorenko
• Intergenerational Transfers and Population Ageing In African Countries
  by Barthélemy Kuate Defo
• The Role Of Support From Children and Own Labour Supply In Supporting The Elderly In Indonesia and Vietnam: A Comparison Of Two Studies
  by Deborah Cobb-Clark
• Family Support For Older People In Europe: Determinants and Consequences
  by Emily Grundy
• Child-To-Parent Financial Transfers and Their Contribution To Reducing Elder Poverty In Korea
  by Erin Hye-Won Kim and Philip J. Cookb
• What Explains Fertility? Evidence From Italian Pension
  Francesco C. Billari and Vincenzo Galasso
• Living Arrangements and Differences In Family Support; A Comparative Perspective
  by Jenny de Jong Gierveld
• Is Intergenerational Solidarity Really On The Decline? Cautionary Evidence From Thailand
  by John Knodel
• NationalTransfers Accounts: Concepts and Some Examples From Latin America and Asia
  by Jorge Bravo and Mauricio Holz
• Family Disruptions and Social Support Among Older People Across Europe
  by Karen Glaser, Cecilia Tomassini, Emily Agree
• Gender, Generation, and Economic Transfers In Ismalia, Egypt
  by Kathryn M. Yount, Ph.D., Solveig Cunningham, Ph.D., Emily Agree, Ph.D., Michal Engelman, MHS
• Notes Concerning Older’s Patronage In The Arab Countries
  by Dr. Kheder Zakaria
• Intergenerational Economic Transfers and Population Ageing In Latin America
  by Luis Rosero Bixby
• Living Arrangements Of Older Adults In China: The Interplay Among Preferences, Realities, and Health
  by Melanie Dawn Sereny
• Intergenerational Reciprocity and The Well-Being Of Older Adults In Rural China
  by Merrill Silverstein
• Protecting Older Persons Against Violence, Abuse and Discrimination
  by Monica Ferreira
• Addressing The Challenges Of Population Ageing In Eastern Europe: Policies and Constraints
  by Nikolai Botev
• Social Policies, Family Arrangements and Population Ageing In Cuba
  by Rolando García Quiñones
• The Dinamics Of Multigenerational Care In Singapore
  by Thang Leng Leng and Kalyani K.Mehta
• Families and Intergenerational Solidarity In Mexico: Challenges and Opportunities
  by Verónica Montes de Oca Zavala

The views expressed in these papers or presentations are the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, the Doha International Family Institute

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