ten - Progress in gerontology: where are we going now?

Summary

Introduction

When we first began to address the question in this chapter's title, our first and conventional response was to compile a calendar of the principal institutional and funding developments of recent years. That compilation tells a useful story, but it soon became clear that, to understand the many and sometimes conflicting directions of change in the subject, in research funding and priorities, and in older people's situation in society, analysis was needed. ‘Progress’ implies goals and destinations and, in the production of knowledge, these are the outcome of a complex interchange of ideas and ambitions between funders and researchers. To understand the roles of gerontological knowledge and gerontologists, it is first necessary to be clear about the interest groups or constituencies that are concerned with the circumstances and welfare of (past and future) older people. When they are specified, we can begin to understand their priority goals and their information needs.

This chapter presents our understanding of the connections in contemporary Britain between, on the one side, the interest groups that are concerned with the well-being of older people and, on the other side, information providers – including gerontologists. It aims to clarify the roles of gerontological knowledge and gerontologists in the debates and decision-making processes. The chapter has three main sections: the first sets out our understanding of the ‘stakeholder groups’, their interactions with each other and with societal change, and the role of information in both policy debates and administrative and practice change. The second reviews the growth of gerontology and its major branches, and then reports recent institutional developments in Britain as first intended, but with a twist: a case study of the interaction between the members and officials of the Welsh Assembly Government and gerontological advisers. The chapter concludes with an audit of areas of progress.

Stakeholders and objectives

Gerontology encompasses the study of older people and biological ageing. That immediately points to quite disparate topics: on the one hand, the factors and structures that condition the absolute and relative material well-being of older people at different times and places and, on the other, the fundamental genetic and biochemical processes of the ageing of the soma.