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Generations in Aging Societies: Inequalities, Cleavages, Conflicts

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Challenges of Aging

Abstract

Age groups and generations are an important basis of social inequality. This raises two questions that I will discuss in this chapter: first, how age- and generation-based inequalities have developed and are affected by current social change, and second, how these inequalities translate into social cleavages and conflicts. Sustained inequalities may lead to cleavages between distinct population groups. Cleavages create the potential for conflicts. Whether and to what extent these conflicts manifest themselves openly depend on the mobilization of the actors on both sides of the rift. However, there are also links which reach across the cleavages. Aging societies marked by demographic discontinuity depend heavily on these links for maintaining societal integration. The links are created by a range of institutions — above all, political institutions such as parties and unions on the one hand and families on the other. This potential for generational integration is threatened, though, by the current changes in social structure and the welfare state.

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Authors
  1. Martin Kohli
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Augsburg, Germany

    Cornelius Torp

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© 2015 Martin Kohli

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Kohli, M. (2015). Generations in Aging Societies: Inequalities, Cleavages, Conflicts. In: Torp, C. (eds) Challenges of Aging. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137283177_14

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