Intergenerational solidarity and family support networks in cross-cultural perspective

This study deals with one of the most crucial social issues of our times – generational relations, familial organization, and the support that elder generations can expect to receive from their adult children and the wider kin group. This topic has only recently found heightened attention, owing to rapidly aging societies in the Western world over the last few decades, a process that after a time lag will also affect the developing countries. The combined effects of higher life expectancy and a decline in birth rates have been producing fundamental changes. By the middle of the twenty-first century, the old and the young will represent an equal share of the world’s population. Globally, the proportion of those aged 60 years and over is expected to more than double, rising from 10 to 21 percent between 2000 and 2050, while the proportion of children will decline by a third, from 30 to 21 percent. We will soon enter an unprecedented period of history in which persons over 60 years old will outnumber those aged 15 years and younger. The same trend is expected in developing countries, where the proportion of elderly persons is expected to rise from 8 percent at present to 19 percent by 2050, while the proportion of children will fall from 33 percent to 22 percent. Just one hundred years ago, the average life expectancy was somewhere in the mid-forties in Western Europe; at the turn of the millennium it had reached already the late seventies and is expected to rise another 10 years by the year 2050. In comparison, the average life