Globalization and the biopolitics of aging

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    Abstract

    Aging and globalization: without doubt, these are among the primary processes of transformation in the contemporary world. Both have a long history: in the first instance dating back to the murky origins of life itself, and in the second stretching as far into the past as the large-scale movements of trade and culture recorded by the earliest chroniclers. But in the contemporary capitalist world, these processes of change have acquired a new intensity and prominence, so much so that it is by now commonplace to hear both referred to in drastic terms. The global aging crisis, the age [End Page 161] wave, the longevity revolution, the baby bust: such are the monikers used to describe the unprecedented and rapid aging of the world's population in the past three decades. Equally suggestive of an epochal shift are those phrases that evoke the massive reorganization of space and time under capitalist globalization: the end of history, the borderless world, the rise of network society, the passage to Empire. Whatever the theoretical-political positions that underlie these catch phrases, they attest to a growing awareness, experience, and in some cases, resistance to these mutually implicated processes of transformation. One difficulty in studying the relation of aging to globalization is that the changes produced by one process are often difficult to distinguish from those brought about by the other. The politics of immigration, the surge in biotechnology, the deregulation of financial markets, the changing face of labor: all have important implications for aging, but cannot be understood in isolation from currently unfolding changes in the global organization of capitalism. While the present article examines briefly these specific instances of intersection between aging and globalization, its primary purpose is to provide theoretical and practical directions for future studies of the interaction between these complex processes of change.
    Original languageEnglish
    Number of pages26
    JournalCR : the new centennial review
    Publication statusPublished - 2003

    Keywords

    • Aging
    • Capitalism
    • Globalization
    • Political aspects
    • Social aspects
    • Social change

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