A Study on Elderly Poverty from a Life Course Perspective

 本研究基于2008年4-8月间对23名北京市贫困老人进行的生命史访谈,采用生命历程范式的视角探析了贫困老人的生命发展轨迹,并区分出6种不同的轨迹类型:整体起落/晚年上升;整体起落/晚年水平;整体起落/晚年下降;整体平稳/晚年上升;整体平稳/晚年水平;整体平稳/晚年下降。本研究得出的主要结论为:1.贫困老年人是异质性很高的群体,他们有着大为迥异的贫困形成与变动过程,并且,即便已至晚年,他们的贫困状况仍然按照各自的轨迹特征继续发生变动;2.贫困老人陷入贫困的促动力大多根植在晚年之前的生活经历中,与晚年相联结的因素很大程度上是作为维持贫困状况使之难以扭转的维持力而非根源性的促动力,并且,在此基础上,我们对贫困老人的"突发性贫困"与"延续性贫困"进行了区分;3.与建国后急遽的社会变迁相联结的非预期生命事件对于老人生命历程中贫困地位的流动型态具有非常强的诠释力;4.本文梳理出5种生命事件与晚年贫困的关系脉络。 

Based on a series of biographical interviews with 23 people aged 60 -82 in 2008, this article reports an in-depth study of life trajectories among low-income elder people in Beijing.The findings show that a variety of trajectory patterns exhibit among those elders.With three directions in old age (improving , level and declining)and patterns over lifespan (smooth and fluctuating), their trajectories are categorized into six types.Case studies are presented to illustrate each type of trajectories.Elder' s life course paradigm is used in this study to analyze elder people' s life stories.The main conclusions include:(1)although all of the poor elders belong to “ the poor” in current stage , they are not homogenous group since they have diverse processes of poverty creation and maintenance;(2)the causes of old age poverty are mainly rooted in previous early-life experience rather than factors linked to late-life stage;(3)in Chinese context , the unexpected life events created under abrupt social transitions accounted much for the fluctuating of elderly people' s poverty trajectories;(4)five types of relations were found between life events and old age poverty.

徐静； 徐永德

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