A manifesto for the age-friendly movement

Population ageing is putting significant pressure on urban spaces all over the world. Since the mid-2000s, the need to create ‘age-friendly cities and communities’, meaning places where older people are actively involved, valued and supported, has emerged as a major concern for urban policy development.

The World health organization has driven this age-friendly agenda through its Global network for age-friendly cities and communities (GNAFCC). The GNAFCC has had a rapid increase in membership, reaching 821 cities and communities across the world by 2019. This world-wide growth has contributed to the development of age-friendly initiatives addressing diverse issues such as green spaces, mobility and walkability, home adaptions and community services.

Despite these successes, there are questions about the future progress of the urban age-friendly movement. First, the movement has tended to ignore the impact of social and economic inequalities along with the problems facing low-income communities within cities. Second, financial pressures on cities, linked with economic austerity, have placed significant constraints on budgets, reducing the scope of age-friendly initiatives.

Against this background, we have set out a 10 point manifesto for the age-friendly movement. The aim of the manifesto is to stimulate debate and encourage new approaches amongst stakeholders, including urban planners, community developers, health and social care professionals, policy-makers, NGO:s, and not least, older people themselves.

2. Integrating neighbourhood change
Developing an age-friendly approach necessitates recognition the importance of the neighbourhood in the lives of older people. This involves providing access to natural and green spaces, ensuring safety and security, as well as offering a range of housing options.

To date progress has been slow in increasing housing choice, beyond specialist provision such as retirement villages and extra-care housing, despite the fact that the majority of older people prefer to live in communities with a mix of ages. Meeting this demand will require a creative partnership between older people, housing association, building companies and other relevant groups.

3. Challenging social inequality and exclusion
The age-friendly movement contains a strong message about maintaining older people actively engaged in society, but less attention has been paid to the inequalities associated with ageing. The experience of ageing differs between older women and men, different ethnic groups, those with more versus less financial resources, and also varies as a consequence of events such as divorce or redundancy.

A key task for future age-friendly policies will therefore be to increase equity of access to the basic necessities and decision-making processes of urban life, explicitly addressing persisting gender, social class, ethnic and other inequalities in the older population.

4. Incorporating diversity 
Although the age-friendly project has placed older people at the centre of various initiatives, the movement has tended to ignore the full diversity of ageing experiences. Examples include the marginalisation of black and minority ethnic groups and those within the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (lgbtq) communities. Acknowledging social diversity is therefore an important issue.

This means responding to different cultural interpretations of what ‘age-friendliness’ might mean; shaping policies around the needs of particular groups with contrasting migration histories and life course experiences; and tackling distinctive forms of inequality experienced by particular groups, notably in areas such health, income, and housing.

6. Coproducing age-friendly communities
The coproduction approach aims to put the abovementioned principles of ‘empowerment’ into practice, by building partnerships between older people, their families and communities, and local organisations. These groups work together to jointly develop research and a shared understanding, as well as to design, develop and deliver opportunities, projects and solutions promoting social and political change. In this sense, coproduction methods are at the heart of developing age friendly policies and initiatives to ensure that older people are recognised as key actors in developing the age-friendliness of their communities.

7. Developing creative and participatory age-friendly design
Discussions about ‘age-friendly design’ have primarily focused on principles of universal and inclusive design by improving mobility, walkability, accessibility and seating. However, it is also important to understand age-friendly design as a process that works via the principles of participation, co-production and empowerment.

There is clear appetite within the policy making community to explore these understandings and practices of age-friendly design, but there is also an opportunity to encourage socially-engaged urban practitioners – developers, architects, designers, artists – to intervene proactively in age-friendly cities and communities.

9. Integrating research with policy
The age-friendly approach has developed at a rapid rate but this has occurred in the absence of a body of research which tells us about the effectiveness and impact of such work. For example, whether it benefits some groups rather than others; what contribution it makes to the wellbeing of older people; whether it leads to improvements in urban design; and whether it strengthens support networks within neighbourhoods.

Establishing answers to these questions will be important if local and municipal authorities are to give financial support to age-friendly programmes. There is a need to create stronger linkages with academic institutions from multiple disciplinary perspectives to build process evaluations and undertake comparative studies.

10. Strengthening international networking
Many of the achievements and advancements in developing age-friendly policies have been fuelled by the who GNAFCC. The network has offered a unifying and integrated narrative to advance ageing work in civil society, government and the private sector.

However, the key question is how to expand and raise the ambition of the age-friendly movement in a difficult economic climate with limited funding and competing demands for resources. This requires creative ways to mobilise new resources, stronger links with academic institutions and researchers, and combining local presence with a true global strategy for the age-friendly movement.