Between Isolation and Breakthrough
Older People in Belarus
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
In Belarus as well, a clear decline of the population is to be expected. The aging of the population is already a burden on the welfare system and presents great challenges to society. But the government is clinging to the model of the “Soviet welfare state” and encumbering the activity of civil society in the field of welfare. Nonetheless, there are initiatives that are making an effort to improve the position of older people in society. The organisation “Social Projects” in Homel’ shows how cooperation between civil society and the state can function in caring for the old.
(Osteuropa 5/2010, pp. 263–274)