CREATING SUSTAINABLE AND RESILIENT INTERGENERATIONAL COMMUNITIES: LESSONS FROM FOUR SOCIETIES

Abstract

Rapid population aging points to significant challenges for the 21st Century including the maintenance of sustainable and resilient intergenerational communities. While on-going work is done on achieving increased healthy life expectancy for active retirees, it is clear that there will always be a need for more understanding by the younger and older generations about the aging process, their changing roles and responsibilities to assure intergenerational community integration. Lacking that awareness and commitment by both the young and old, the prospects for intergenerational conflict is great. This symposium will showcase four (4) presentations from Indonesia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Hawaii that collectively provides cross-national recommendations for the creation of intergenerational communities. The Indonesian study report on the positive value of informal intergenerational caregiving programs which moderate the cost of eldercare services provided with public funds. However, this study also notes that the implementation of these types of programs throughout Indonesia is dependent upon intergenerational leadership to mobilize the generations. The Singapore study is based on paying attention to what older adults are saying as what is important to age well. The study suggests that the next step calls for increased intergenerational awareness early in life for all generations. Hong Kong reports on its approach to intergenerational programs and the emerging lessons from that experience for the community. The Hawaii presentation reports on its Age-Friendly Initiative that embraces an intergenerational approach with its first calls for building awareness, promoting active aging and reducing ageism. This session will provide some common universal threads to build sustainable and resilient intergenerational communities.