Retirement and the Moral Economy: An Historical Interpretation of the German Case

EIWO's Theoretical Perspectives

“…Kohli sums up this obligation with the term of the 'moral economy of a work society'. The institutionalisation of the life phase of old age through the creation of the institution of retirement, which occurred with the division of the life course into three parts, also follows this moral economy, conceptualised as an 'earned claim' after a (working) life-long commitment to the labour society (Kohli 1987;Naegele 1992).…”

“…aims at enabling and supporting people in all phases of life to acquire, recognise and also use options for shaping their own life courses and their employment biographies in a self-responsible and jointly responsible manner and, from a socio-political point of view, as risk and problem-free as possible. With regard to the function of shaping the (tripartite) life course, old-age and retirement policies are of particular importance in their functions directly related to the 'moral economy' of a labour society (Kohli 1987; see section 8.2).…”

Late working life, exclusion and inequality: National policies and political-economic context in Germany

“…As a consequence, most older employees (and most trade unions) saw earlier retirement both as a significant tool to humanize working conditions for older workers and, particularly against the background of long working careers in often-stressful jobs, not seldom as a 'social right' ('fair earnings for a lifelong high commitment to a company and/or the economy') or as 'a legal claim in a normal employee biography'. Kohli (1987) referred to these ideas as part of his concept of "the moral economy of a working society." 1 2.1.3 Early retirement as a key instrument for adjusting the East German labour markets to the economic transformation…”

“…Until those changes happen, the structuring influence of social policy on one's life course ('institutionalisation') had favoured the development of an independent phase of life in old age, which then developed into a far-reaching biographical orientation towards a socially organised exemption from gainful employment. In the literature on the sociology of ageing, the previous practices of early retirement (and also the change of paradigm to EWL) were thought to be the beginning of the dissolution of the classic division of the life course into three parts, and as the beginning of a gradual de-standardization of the 'normal' employment biography (Kohli 1985(Kohli , 1987(Kohli , 1990Kohli et al 1991;Naegele et al 2002).…”

Conflicts Around Elder Care in Mass Media: A Case Study of a Swedish TV-Documentary and the Reactions to it in Public Discourse

“…This approach is based on a view that normative ideas of reciprocity, justice and obligations influence the way people understand their rights and responsibilities as members of a political community (i.e. 'society'), and that there is -or should be -a correspondence between these sentiments and the rules and economic organization of welfare (Kohli, 1991;Svallfors, 2008;Mau, 2004;Minkler & Cole, 1992). According to Bode (2007, p. 203), this perspective on the relationships between welfare institutions and regulations implies that "institutions of the welfare state must (at least partially) be seen as an expression of moral rationales".…”