Samenvatting

In this article the main question is if care for elderly people meets the justice criteria guaranteeing ‘participatory parity’ as formulated by the political philosopher Nancy Fraser (1989). After introducing justice as participatory parity the article elaborates the ambivalent relationship of care for elderly with concepts as bodily fragility, vulnerability and dependency, and its consequences for participation on equal footing. Then we explore two dominant European discourses on care for elderly, respectively the ‘Long-Term Care’- and the ‘Active Ageing’-discourse, each inspiring EU Member States’ struggle with providing ‘just’ care to ageing populations. Although social care is a Member States’ issue, not belonging to EU jurisdiction, the EU gives ambivalent direction to policy reforms via agenda setting, advice and program subsidies due to the two struggling discourse logics. We show this ambivalence by presenting gaps and biases in long-term care for elderly people in several European countries. Finally, we present, on basis of a cross-national study on care practices, implications of failing care policies and current discourses for older care-receivers and their care workers. The article concludes with an alternative care-regime based on justice as participatory parity.