"Not a care home but a political home": How feminist activism influences women's aging.

Abstract

A central mantra of aging centers on staying socially engaged - a prescription supported by numerous studies reporting how social engagement enhances well-being in later life. Research in this area has primarily focused on interaction with family and friends, paid work, and unpaid activities such as volunteering, while devoting less attention to involvement in organizations with explicitly political goals. Political engagement - particularly activism oriented toward social change - may not only shape communities but also transform how individuals experience and understand their own aging. This transformative potential may be especially significant for women, who are often devalued as they age beyond youth. To explore this possibility, we draw on nine semi-structured interviews with members of the Older Feminist Network (OFN), an organization established in 1982 in the United Kingdom in response to the mainstream feminist movement's limited attention to older women's issues. Consistent with prior studies of other women-centered organizations, we found evidence that involvement in OFN provided social interaction, as well as physical and cognitive activity, that can enrich well-being in later life. Our analyses, however, revealed that its impact extended beyond social connection: It fostered a sense of purpose through shared political commitments and reframed aging through feminist consciousness. By turning the focus from social to political engagement in later life, our study reveals how activism can provide women with an empowering perspective on aging.