Working Group 5.5

Is Rural Europe Really Old? Demographical Dynamics – Social Impacts

Convenors:
Maria Cristina Sousa Gomes, University of Aveiro mcgomes@ua.pt
(contact person)
Elisabete Figueiredo, University of Aveiro
Maria Luís Pinto, University of Aveiro

“The 20th century was an era of sustained population growth; the 21st century will be an era of ageing” (Alexia Fürnkranz-Prskawetz and Gustav Feichtinger, 2007: 11)

The ageing of the population, which is considered to be most pronounced in rural areas, poses new challenges for European societies. Demographic ageing is a complex and heterogeneous process, whose characteristics vary between countries and regions. Besides the repercussions of the decrease in fertility, longer life expectancy and the implications of population migration, it is also important to understand the population itself as a variable which structures and organises space. On the one hand, the population is an outcome of all these processes; on the other, it also conditions socio-demographic problems. Such aspects take on an increased interest when combined with broader social movements such as those of counter urbanization, or new forms of occupation or lifestyles which have come to emerge in rural areas, and which are associated with different initiatives and economic activities such as tourism.
Not only are rural areas seen to have aged more, but also a more or less bucolic vision of rural ageing prevails. However, such perceptions which associate lifestyles with a specific age group are less and less relevant at a time when life expectancy continues to grow and when release from formal employment occurs at all sorts of ages and in all sorts of circumstances and does not signify withdrawal into inactivity.
It is therefore essential to consider ageing in all its dimensions as well as the consequences. Ageing in rural areas reveals heterogeneous characteristics and
specificities which result from local contexts. Even the threshold that counts as ageing is open to question: Is it age which differentiates the process of getting older or, as time goes by, does the concept of ageing advance with old age in itself?
This Working Group aims at discussing issues related to demographic ageing which allow for the analysis and comparison of the following:

* rural ageing within the European context, considering its characteristics and social impacts;
* the emerging realities and diverse social phenomena which comprise the process of ageing;
* the repercussions of demographic dynamics as well as the effects of socio-economic dynamics on the ageing process in rural areas;
* the direct and indirect policies and measures which have an intervention purpose regarding rural ageing, as well as the reflections of other political measures on the process of ageing.