Planning Later Life Bioethics and Public Health in Ageing Societies

This book examines the relevance of modern medicine and healthcare in shaping the lives of elderly persons and the practices and institutions ofageing societies. Combining individual and social dimensions, Planning Later Life discusses the ethical, social, and political consequences of increasing life expectancies and demographic change in the context of biomedicine and public health. By focusing on the field of biomedicine and healthcare, the authors engage readers in a dialogue on the ethical and social implications of recent trends in dementia research and care, advance healthcare planning, or the rise of anti-ageing medicine and prevention. Bringing together the largely separated debates of individualist bioethics on the one hand, and public health ethics on the other, the volume deliberately considers the entanglements of envisioning, evaluating, and controlling individual and societal futures. So far, the process of devising and exploring the various positive and negative visions and strategies related to later life has rarely beenreflected systematically from a philosophical, sociological, and ethical point of view. As such, this book will be crucial to those working and studying in the life sciences, the humanities, and the social sciences, particularly in the areas of bioethics, social work, gerontology and aging studies, healthcare and social service, sociology, social policy, and geography and population studies.

List of Figures and Tables Notes on Contributors Introduction Mark Schweda, Larissa Pfaller,and Silke Schicktanz Part 1: Conceptions of Aging and Old Age 1. "A Season to Everything"? Considering Life-Course Perspectives in Bioethical and Public-Health Discussions on Aging Mark Schweda 2.Becoming Oneself: Toward a New Philosophy of Ageing Thomas Rentsch 3. Third Age and Fourth Age in Aging Societies – Divergent Social and Ethical Discourses François Höpflinger 4. The Nature of the Fourth Age as a Challenge to Aging Societies Paul Higgs and Chris Gilleard Part 2: Perspectives and Problems of Old Age in the Context of Medicine and Healthcare 5. Old Age, Potentials, and Vulnerability Andreas Kruse 6. Competence and Cognitive Deterioration: Are We Paying Enough Attention to Ethical Issues? Perla Werner and Silke Schicktanz 7. Opt In or Opt Out? Rethinking the Provision of Life-Sustaining Medical Technology to the 'Old Old' Hsiu-I Yang 8. Not Growing Old – Gracefully Søren Holm 9. How to Think About Age-Group Justice: The Capabilities Approach Nancy S. Jecker Part 3: Individual Provisions and Public Policies in Aging Societies 10. Final Decisions for the Final Crisis: Hopes and Hypes Regarding the Advance Directive in Germany Kai Brauer 11. Preparing Existential Decisions in Later Life: Advance Healthcare Planning Ralf J. Jox 12. Articulating the Case for the Longevity Dividend S. Jay Olshansky 13. Paradoxes of Planning Later Life: Anti-Aging Practices and the Lived Body Larissa Pfaller and Frank Adloff 14. The Visionary Shaping of Dementia Research: Imaginations and Scenarios in Biopolitical Narratives and Ethical Reflections Silke Schicktanz 15. Solidarity and Family Care for an Aging Population Ruud ter Meulen 16. Legacies, Generations, and Aging Futures: The Ethics of Intergenerativity Stephen Katz and Peter J. Whitehouse Index

Mark Schweda is Research Fellow at the Department for Medical Ethics and History of Medicine, University Medical Center Göttingen. Larissa Pfaller is Research Associate at the Institute of Sociology at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg and currently Deputy Professor at the University of Hamburg. Kai Brauer is a sociologist and teaches empirical methods and sociology of aging at Carinthia University of Applied Sciences (CUAS). Frank Adloff is Professor of Sociology at the University of Hamburg. Silke Schicktanz is a bioethicist and Professor for Cultural and Ethical Studies of Biomedicine at the Department for Medical Ethics and History of Medicine, University Medical Center Göttingen.