Changing Landscapes of Support in the Lives of Chinese Urban Elders: Voices from Wuhan Neighbourhoods

Rose Gilroy
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Rose Gilroy: School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape, Newcastle University, Newcastle NE1 7RU, England

Environment and Planning C, 2013, vol. 31, issue 3, 428-443

Abstract: The change from a Soviet-style planned economy to one influenced by the market has rippled through all areas of Chinese life. This paper explores how changes to state financial support together with changing family dynamics are impacting on urban Chinese elders. Drawing on exploratory fieldwork in Wuhan, the paper takes an everyday-life approach to reveal new inequalities for older people. Changes to health-care costs are causing anxiety among many elders and plunging others into poverty. However, it is the family that emerges as pivotal to older people's economic and social well-being. For those with decently employed children there are emerging opportunities for independence in later life; conversely, where children are low paid or out of work, it is parental income that is taking the strain. The paper concludes by setting these findings in a broader global context.

Keywords: China; ageing; health-care costs; institutional support; family practices; industrial change (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:envirc:v:31:y:2013:i:3:p:428-443

DOI: 10.1068/c1193

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