Presentation from the 2016 International Conference on Aging in the Americas hosted at the University of Texas at San Antonio Downtown Campus, Sept. 14-16.

1. International Conference
on Aging in the Americas
USA, September 14 – 16, 2016.
The aging in México and
the role of the CSO’s
Dra. Verónica Montes de Oca Zavala
Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, UNAM
Dra. Patricia Rea Ángeles
CONACYT/Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, UNAM
Dr. Ronald Angel
The University of Texas at Austin

2.  Background
1. The Mexican characterization of population ageing
2. Social and Political Participation
3. CSOs in Mexico City and citizenship of older people: types
of organizations
4. Different forms of aging and different forms of
organization
 Some final considerations
Fuente: CEAFA/ OMS/ Día mundial del Alzheimer

3. Background
 Economic security
 Pensions
 Health Care and Medical Coverage
 Households and families
 Social Networks and favorable
environment, but……
 What about social civil organizations?

4. Theoretical Approach
 Active Aging (WHO, 2002)
 the process of optimizing
opportunities for health,
participation and security in
order to improve the quality of
life of persons aged
 Generativity (Villar, 2012)
 Social Participation (Viveros, 2005)
 Reference Human Right
Approach (Alfama, et al 2013)
 Citizenship and Human Rights
Exercise (ASO, 2015)
Fuente: WHO

5. Political and Social Stages for Human Rights for
Older Persons in Latino America (2002-2015)

6. Organization of American States. Inter-American
Convention for the protection of Human Rights of Older
Persons (OEA, 2015)
 Right to social participation and
the construction of citizenship,
as well as political participation
and non-discrimination as right
key to the development and
understanding of other human
rights.
 Article 8. Right to the
participation and community
integration
 Article 27. Political rights
 Article 28 Right of meeting and
association; among others.
Fuente: Red Mayor

7. Objective and method
 How will have configured the CSO’s with older persons in
Mexico? What is the role of the transition from a
asistencialism approach to human rights perspective?
 What can I do for reinforce the human rights perspective
in the CSO’s without forget the quality of life?.
 Describe and analyze different CSO’s with older persons
in Mexico city
 Analyze the narratives of older persons about ageing,
active participation and legacy (generativity).
 2015 and 2016: 9 Focus group and 48 interviews (30
women and 18 men)

8.  National Survey about Political Culture and Citizenship Practices (ENCUP
2012):
 The persons with 55 years is variable by type of organizations, per example:
the men tend to have a greater participation in organizations citizens
(17.5%), trade unions (14.9%), parties political (11.2%) and groups political
(10.2%).
 The women in that group of age also participate but to a lesser extent, for
example in organizations citizens (8.8%), parties political (6.2%), groups
political (5.6%) and unions (3.5%) (ENCUP 2012).
 MHAS, 2013: 15.8% of persons with 55 years and older (13.8% men y
17.2% women) participates in work voluntary not paid by the
organizations (at least 1 time to the week).
Social and Political Participation

9. Promoting Human Rights in National Law of
Rights for Older Persons approved in 2002
 (1) of the integrity, dignity and preference;
 (2) of the legal protection;
 (3) from the health, food and the family;
 (4) of education;
 (5) of the work;
 (6) of the assistance social;
 (7) of the participation;
 (8) of the denounces popular;
 (9) of the access to the services (Diario Oficial de la Federación 2002).

10. CSO in the Mexico City and the older persons
citizenship: types of organizations
 Type of social and political participation according with
the economic changes process
 Neighbors Organizations
 Civil Associations (A.C.)
 Unions
 Private Assistance Institutions (I.A.P.)
 Ethnic Communities
 Political Organizations
 Religion Organizations

11. Different forms of aging and different
forms of organization
 A) Organization focused on quality of life and personal self-development
 B) Organization that combines reference of the quality of life and the rights
human
 C) Organization centered on quality of life and sustainability economic based
on care
 (D) Organization focused on human rights focused on the economy and
economic sustainability
 E) Organization that combines the quality of life, sustainability economic and
human rights
 F) Other organizations inside the country that combine defense of human
rights and economic sustainability

12. A) Organization focused on quality of life and personal self-
development
 Amanecer Veracruzana
 Delegación Iztapalapa (higher degree marginalization)
 Women of 75 years and older, widowed, migrants, most with primary
incomplete, without pension income and dedicated to the household
task.
 The aging that experience them women can be described as an active
aging, focused in the area neighborhood, based in recreational
activities that seek the body functionality front it disability and
chronic diseases.
 This organization is characterized by the search of supports
Government but with poor State response.

13. B) Organization that combines the quality with Human Rights
 Grupo Renueva
 Located in the center of development Social and Cultural "Carmen
Aristegui" located in the delegation Gustavo to. Madero of the city of
Mexico.
 People with medium and high studies but are mostly women who ever
worked but not all guaranteed a pension in old age, most are married.
 High degree of autonomy, independence, personal mobility,
intellectual and physical development
 The active aging is part of the daily life
 Clear awareness of the aging and of the responsibility of the same
 The exercise of the human rights as a constant
 Enjoyment by social and community organization

14. C) Organization centered in the quality of life reference and
sustainability economic based on care
 Granito de Arena A. C.
 It is common to find more women than men with more than 70 years.
 Provide assistance extended to people with higher cognitive deteriorating
and little personal mobility
 The older persons with functional or cognitive deterioration have little
level of organization
 The caregivers are very active in the mediation with the State Authorities
in themes: health, recreation, social security, education, culture,
personal mobility, and others more.

15. D) Organization focused on human rights and
economic sustainability
 Pensioners of State for the Instituto de Seguridad y Servicios Sociales de los
Trabajadores del Estado (ISSSTE)
 Union Mexican of Electricians (SME)
 Coordinator national of workers of the education (CNTE)
 Mixed with male preponderance, retirees who lived an early retirement.
 Organizations of character Government and high degree of empowerment
 Characterized by a strong political organization, high and media studies that enhance its
organizational level.
 There is not ageing perspective, quality of life or active aging.
 These organizations lived the past benefits of a State that protected them as strategic
sectors of the economy for a model of development previous neoliberalism.

16. Foto: Periódico El Mercurio de Tamaulipas
Foto: Periódico El Excelsior
Muchos de sus integrantes,
en décadas anteriores
lucharon para obtener
mejores condiciones
laborales por medio de la
organización sindical, hoy en
día continúan organizados
para demandar al Estado el
respeto de sus garantías
individuales y colectivas
ante las problemáticas
derivadas de la aplicación
de diversas reformas,
especialmente la
relacionada con el Sistema
de Pensiones de México.

17. E) Organization that combines the quality of life,
sustainability economic and rights human
 Pensioners by National University (UNAM, Pioners in Creativity and
Liberty, PICRELI)
 Low grade of social organization but high grade of citizenship
 High grade of schooling, that affects in the promotion and defense of
these rights
 Basically women with degrees of PhD and with a high labor trajectory
 High grade of empowerment and generativity

18. f) Other organizations inside the country that
combine defense of human rights and economic
sustainability
 One of the aspects that stand
out is the character of urban-
rural or indigenous in our
country.
 In the States and rural
environment defined the form of
aging.
 Vgr. A community of Oaxaca
State fighting for recognition of
their most basic rights (health,
food, housing).
Foto: Tirso Navarrete

19. Committee Community of Electricity
“Sol de Cachimbo”, Oaxaca
 Formed by grandmothers and communities Huave-
Zapotecs who, through a process organizational
strong, without collaboration of the State and with
the support of various organizations national and
international as Comité Melendre, Indian Goverment,
Enel Green Power, ONU-Mujeres and Barefoot
Collegue (Tilonia, India), they have become Solar
engineers and electrify their own communities.
Fuente: Juchitán Informa
Fuente: La Jornada

20. Community organizing around the International Festival
Xepe an Cöicoos y las Músicas del Mundo, en Punta Chueca, Sonora.
 Grandparents of the nation Comcáac have a role important in the
transmission of the ancestral knowledge to them new generations.
 Entre otras cosas el Festival busca:
 Fomentar y fortalecer la cohesión comunitaria y el desarrollo
social.
 Compartir con el mundo a Socaaix (Punta Chueca) en toda su
magnificencia histórica, simbólica y ritual.
 Fomentar el diálogo cultural e intergeneracional como vía para
lograr la comunicación e interacción entre personas y grupos con
identidades culturales específicas.
 Honrar los espacios y las manifestaciones sagradas a través del
conocimiento de la riqueza natural y cultural de los Comca’ ac.
 Generar espacios para la para la reflexión, convivencia y expresión
artística.
 Dar acceso a la comunidad Comc’ac a bienes y servicios culturales.
Foto: Tirso Navarrete

21. Ecclesial communities
 Communities of high marginalization in Veracruz.
 They form the health houses, do not focus on the aging but on
community development, self-management, and the solution
of local problems from a generational perspective.
 Are mostly female with high degrees of poverty, low schooling
and conditions of health poor, but where the training has
result successful for the self-management immediate and
awareness of context.
 There is the awareness of the context but also the
development of the spirituality and the action social
community.
 they do not have government support but even with violence
and high discrimination towards certain organizations
environments.
 Consciousness of class, gender and ethnicity, although not be
addresses the aging, but the older persons are integrated
actively.
Fuente: Fe y Resistencia

22. Some Final Considerations
 The process of demographic change toward the aging in Mexico, is parallel with
changes in the international and national of the human rights and transformations
in the economic development model tending to the privatization.
 We found CSO with older persons and different combines perspectives on quality
of life and self-development, economic sustainability and human rights.
 The active aging paradigm is unknown in the organizations, but the human right
have a little presence.
 The ethnic and multicultural approach is very relevant for understand the CSO in
rural and communities in Mexico.
 Government institutions must be aware of this type of organizations to promote
educational aspects and human rights.

23. References
 Alfama, E., Canal, R. y Cruells, M. (2013). Las políticas de envejecimiento activo
en el Estado español (2002-2012): ¿promoviendo la ciudadanía y la participación de
las personas mayores?, España
 Castrejón, J. L. (2016) Diferencias en el envejecimiento de las poblaciones
indígenas, afrodescendientes y no indígenas ni afrodescendientes en México, 2015,
ponencia presentada en el Primer Encuentro Envejecimiento e Interculturalidad.
Los alcances de la ciudadanía y la sociedad civil, IISUNAM, México, 16-19 de
agosto.
 Diario Oficial de la Federación (2002) Ley de los Derechos de las Personas Adultas
Mayores [http://www.diputados.gob.mx/LeyesBiblio/pdf/245_171215.pdf]
revisada 29 de agosto 2016.
 Diario Oficial de la Federación (2011) Reforma constitucional en materia de
derechos humanos [http://www2.scjn.gob.mx/red/constitucion/inicio.html]
revisada 29 de agosto 2016.
 OMS. (2002). Envejecimiento activo: un marco político. Grupo Orgánico de
Enfermedades No Transmisibles y Salud Mental. Departamento de Prevención de
las Enfermedades No Transmisibles y Promoción de la Salud, 37(S2), 74-105.
 Organización de Estados Americanos (2015), Convención Interamericana para la
Protección de los Derechos Humanos de las Personas Mayores, Nueva York.