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Identifying priorities for aging policies in two Portuguese communities

Publication . Bárrios, Maria João; Fernandes, Ana Alexandre; Fonseca, António M.

The aging population has an impact on health, social and economic issues in regards to individuals, communities and organizations. The challenge for local policies in response to aging is to create sufficient resources to meet the population’s needs, wishes and rights as people age. Active aging constitutes one of the guiding perspectives on policies. Taking into account the local governance perspective, the instrument MALPA was created in order to convert the active aging paradigm into a practical approach, as a technique to evaluate and analyze local aging policies. In this research, the MALPA instrument was applied in two Portuguese communities (Coruche and Oeiras). The objective was to identify the intervention priorities of aging policies in both communities, determining if the instrument can facilitate the development of proposals for the improvement of local aging policies. It was possible to evaluate the communities and programs, identifying the least appropriate policy actions regarding the intervention priorities. The results allowed us to identify 10 priorities about: collaborative governance, involvement of the elderly in the policy making process, lifelong learning, economic hardship, policies for all ages, isolated vulnerable and fragile groups, intergenerational contacts, safety in all policies, labor opportunities and conditions and transport network improvement.

2018Journal article

Open access