[Disembedding and remoralization. Old age security and intergenerational relations in globalized welfare capitalism]

The article reconstructs the changes in provision for old age since the 19th century with regard to the ensuing change in intergenerational relationships. The first finding is a broadening of the arenas of provision for old age, a historical cumulation of family (which is still relevant), welfare state and, increasingly, private provision in financial markets, adding up to a 'welfare mix' in old age. This implies a complexification of intergenerational relationships. The second finding is an ambivalent qualitative change: on the one hand relationships between generations become more anonymous and disembedded from primary social relationships; on the other hand they are politicized (they become a public issue) and remoralized. This ambivalence applies to bureaucratic provision for old age in the welfare state, i.e., to social insurance. The main thesis is that--contrary to neoliberal belief--private old-age security in global financial markets cannot be seen as individualistic and moral-free but constitutes an anonymous exchange relationship between generations on financial markets that also raises issues of intergenerational justice. We can expect that these abstract relationships between generations will be politicized and remoralized as a consequence. Welfare state and financial markets offer solutions to problems of previous forms of provision for old age but they also produce new problems of intergenerational relationships.