New Challenges to Ageing in the Rural North

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xiii

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2. Introduction: Ageing in the Rural North

   • Päivi Naskali, Joan R. Harbison, Shahnaj Begum

   Pages 1-10

3. Changing Politics and Welfare Policies in the North

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 11-11

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   2. Older Women, the Capabilities Approach and CEDAW: Normative Foundations and Instruments for Evaluation of the Governance of the Nordic Arctic

      • Eva-Maria Svensson

      Pages 13-30

   3. A Feminist Socio-Legal Approach to Ageing, Gender and Welfare in Northern Sweden

      • Lena Wennberg

      Pages 31-45

   4. The Aged People in the Transitional Elder Care Policy and Service System in Northern Finland

      • Heli Valokivi

      Pages 47-64

   5. Traditional Foundations of Novel Opportunities: Marketization in Finland’s Care Sector

      • Petra Merenheimo

      Pages 65-82

4. Challenges in Meeting Older People’s Needs in the Northern Rural Context

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 83-83

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   2. The Foster Family as a Means of Promoting Social Inclusion of Older People in the Russian North

      • Elena Golubeva, Anastasia Emelyanova

      Pages 85-101

   3. Bringing Dying Back Home? – Northern Finns’ End-of-Life Preparations, Concerns and Care Preferences and Finnish Care Policy’s Emphasis on Care at Home

      • Marjo Outila, Marjaana Seppänen, Pilvikki Lantela, Pekka Vasari

      Pages 103-122

   4. Exploring Age-Friendly Environments in Rural Settings: Case Study from Finnish Lapland

      • Shahnaj Begum

      Pages 123-140

   5. Hit by a Stroke: An Autoethnographic Analysis of Intergenerational Care Across Geographical Distances

      • Marit Aure

      Pages 141-157

   6. Continued Togetherness: Couples Preparing for Old Age

      • Olga Asrun Stefansdottir, Eydis Kristin Sveinbjarnardottir

      Pages 159-171

5. Age, Voice and Resistance

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 173-173

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   2. Are We Really Listening? Ageism, Voice, and Older People’s Diversity in Nordic Societies Undergoing Welfare Change

      • Joan R. Harbison

      Pages 175-191

   3. Voices from the North: Stories About Active Ageing, Everyday Life and Home-Based Care Among Older People in Northern Norway

      • Mai Camilla Munkejord, Walter Schönfelder, Helga Eggebø

      Pages 193-206

   4. Old Women and Men as Political Actors in Finnish Lapland

      • Päivi Naskali

      Pages 207-223

   5. “We Do Not Eat Luxury Food”: A Story About Food and Health in an Old Sami Woman’s Everyday Life in Norway

      • Trine Kvitberg

      Pages 225-238

6. The Transition to Second Modernity: Ageing in the Arctic

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 239-239

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   2. The Individualisation of Ageing

      • Chris Gilleard, Paul Higgs

      Pages 241-251

This book provides an underexplored view of ageing, one that conceives older people as valuable resources in their communities, as active citizens with both voice, and an agency that includes the capacity for resistance. It acknowledges that becoming old with dignity means also paying attention to caring, good health services and the possibility of good death. The book defines age and ageing as multiple, culturally and historically constructed phenomena that are only loosely connected to the years of one’s life. In focusing on the peripheral North located in the Nordic, Canadian and Russian north, it highlights important questions and viewpoints that can be found and adapted to other rural areas. The book answers the following questions: What is the relevance of legislation and international legal agreements in ensuring the rights of elderly people under political and economic changes? What challenges do geographic isolation, changing age structure, and cultural and ecological transformations pose to possibilities for meeting older people’s needs for engagement in society as well as for their care?  As such this book will be of interest to all those working in population aging. 

• Ageing in Rural Arctic Setting
• Changing Age Structure
• Changing Welfare of the Elderly
• Elderly Care and Quality of Life
• Gender, Agency and Voice

• Unit for Gender Studies, Faculty of Education, University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland

  Päivi Naskali, Shahnaj Begum

• School of Social Work, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada

  Joan R. Harbison

Päivi Naskali is a Professor of Gender Studies at the University of Lapland. She is a head of the Finnish University Network of Gender Studies, has worked actively in the National Doctoral School in Gender Studies and edited the Journal of Women’s Studies. Her research interests include gender and ageing in the times of neoliberalism, educational gender politics and feminist pedagogy and philosophy. She has lately been leading a research project The Arctic Change and Elderly Exclusion: A Gender-based Perspective.

 Joan R. Harbison is an Adjunct Professor at Dalhousie University School of Social Work. Her work includes interdisciplinary approaches to research in the fields of ageing, health, and social service delivery. She has published in numerous national and international texts and journals and contributed to many scholarly international, interdisciplinary, development and research projects. Recently she authored the text Contesting Elder Abuse and Neglect: Ageism, Risk, and the Rhetoric of Rights in the Mistreatment of Older People, University of British Columbia Press, Fall, 2016, in collaboration with her interdisciplinary research team from law, sociology and social work.

 Shahnaj Begum is a Post-doctoral researcher at the Unit for Gender Studies in the Faculty of Education of the University of Lapland. Her research focuses on Northern elderly well-being and gender issues in the context of Arctic change. She is a member of the University of the Arctic Thematic Network of Health and Well being in the Arctic.

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