Active Aging: Social Entrepreneuring in Local Communities of Five European Countries

Abstract

Building on the active aging framework, the aim of this study, carried out between 2016 and 2018, is to analyze concrete experiences of older individuals acting as key players of social change in six local communities of five European countries (Bulgaria, Denmark, England, France, Spain). The 19 seniors involved in the study, according to social contexts, individual past experiences, knowledge, and motivations, acted as senior social entrepreneurs, trying to build a pathway towards social solutions for unmet social problems they detected in local communities. Data were collected via templates and questionnaires and analyzed using the thematic analysis. The results highlighted that the 16 local initiatives created by seniors concerned social problems such as food waste, social isolation, multicultural integration, etc. The social solutions implemented by seniors seemed to have the potential to produce social value and, to different degrees, encouraging results and impact. Since this “social experiment” provided evidence that senior social entrepreneuring could be a driver to solve societal problems, policy makers should sustain the spread of both social entrepreneurial mindset and practices at the European level, for catalyzing the active potential of older people for the benefit of European local communities.

New Multilevel Partnerships and Policy Perspectives on Active Ageing in Italy: A National Plan of Action

“…By promoting new AA policies, the process contributes to develop new opportunities for social inclusion and offer older people with different profiles (e.g., health, socio-economic status) new patterns for being engaged in local communities and society. The mechanism initiated by the PoA constitutes both a social innovation [ 56 , 57 ] and a policy innovation [ 37 , 38 ] for AA, since it stimulates a multilevel governance and consultation with a heterogenous stakeholder group which would had never occurred otherwise. The interaction amongst stakeholders is essential to develop common ground, policy objectives and measures for tackling the AA challenge in a comprehensive and coordinated way.…”

Regional Entrepreneurial Capacity

“…Thus, there is a multidimensionality in determining the category of entrepreneurial capacity, each researcher contributes, but in general terms, two main approaches to define entrepreneurial capacity (1) as a personality traits: special immanent properties of the individual; (2) as an ecosystem features: set of conditions for doing business. Recent studies tend to share entrepreneurial intentions [18] may use GEM indicator as an indicator of entrepreneurial capacity) and entrepreneurial capacity, dividing the phase of the entrepreneurial process into "pre-action" (up to the moment of action) and "active" (the emergence of entrepreneurial activity) [19].…”

Active Ageing in Italy: An Evidence-Based Model to Provide Recommendations for Policy Making and Policy Implementation

“…See for example: https://statswiki.unece.org/display/AAI (accessed on 10 January 2022), while AA should not be a top-down imposition, but rather opportunities should be provided for citizens to take action from the bottom-up, through consultative and/or co-decisional participative tools. This is highly important in the perspective of producing socially innovative solutions in order to solve social problems [26,27]. The effectiveness of the stakeholder involvement depends on its capacity to address local inputs through a coordinated and multilevel approach among public institutions and actors from civil society and the Third Sector [28].…”