Human rights are not just for the young, yet many older people’s rights are disregarded or violated by their governments and societies. Drawing on fifteen years of work in more than sixty countries, a new HelpAge International report documents how the rights and needs of older people are neglected, and their contributions to society ignored. Given that the world’s population is ageing rapidly, this neglect amounts to an urgent problem - even more urgent in developing countries where many older people, and older women in particular, live in poverty.

The rights and needs of older people tend to be low on both national and international policy agendas, argues a new report by HelpAge International. Although adopted in 1991, the United Nations (UN) Principles for Older People have yet to be systematically implemented. The report, ‘The Mark of a Noble Society: human rights and older people’, explores the relationship between poverty and human rights, focusing on the violations of economic, social and civil rights that older women and men suffer across the world. Older people make important contributions towards their own and their families’ economic and social needs, but their needs and contributions are rarely acknowledged in local, national or international contexts. Drawing on UN human rights instruments, and Principles for Older Persons, the report proposes a rights-based framework which integrates the needs and concerns of older people into policymaking.

Most of the developing world is growing old before it is rich, with severe consequences for those who are vulnerable because they are poor or ill. The report argues that the systematic neglect of the rights and needs of older people is increasingly problematic for a number of reasons:

• The world’s population is ageing rapidly: France took 115 years to increase the proportion of its older population from seven to fourteen percent, but the same process occurred this century between 1970 and 1996 in Japan, and in many developing countries it may take less than twenty years.
• A large and increasing proportion of older people live in developing countries: 61 percent of the world’s population of older people already live in poorer countries, which will increase to nearly 70 per cent by 2025.
• Older people are among the poorest, whether North or South: social development policy takes little account of the elderly poor. Despite the current emphasis on poverty alleviation, research on the causes and character of poverty among older people is extremely limited. Instead, poverty assessments focus on issues of child nutrition, child and young-adult education, infant and maternal mortality rates and reproductive health.
• Poor older women are particularly vulnerable: women outlive men in most countries, and older women are more likely to be widows, entailing multiple disadvantages gender, widowhood and old age.

Despite the systematic neglect of the rights and needs of older poor people, most make crucial contributions to their own, their families’, and their communities’ wellbeing. Ageing is often perceived as a burden on society, but older people are an important resource for other generations. Older people can, and increasingly do, participate in civil society to claim and insist on their rights.

HelpAge International’s report sets out a framework for action, based on the UN Principles for Older Persons and five key principles of:

• Independence
• Participation
• Care
• Dignity
• Self-fulfilment

By documenting the neglect of their rights across the world, the report is expected to persuade policymakers of the importance of safeguarding the rights of older people.

Source(s):
‘The mark of a noble society: human rights and older people’, HelpAge International by Sylvia Beales (2000) available as a PDF file Full document.
‘The Ageing and Development Report: Poverty, Independence And The World’s Older People’, 1999, published by Earthscan in association with HelpAge International Full document.

Funded by: HelpAge International

id21 Research Highlight: 6 December 2000

Further Information:
Bo Priestley or Sarah Graham-Brown
HelpAge International
67-74 Saffron Hill
London EC1N 8QX
UK

Tel: +44 (0)20 7404 7201
Fax: +44 (0)20 7404 7203
Contact the contributor: press@helpage.org

HelpAge International

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