Social participation amongst older adults is considered generally beneficial and is supported by active ageing policies in Europe. However, efforts to increase the quality of life and enhance the ageing experience may have the unintended consequence of increasing later life inequalities. This study uses six waves from SHARE to illustrate how social participation develops over time and how it is structured by education, financial situation and health status in the context of five European welfare regimes. The level of participation slightly increases over time for the population 55+, whilst the inequalities in access to these activities and their outcomes remain stable. Therefore, support of these activities does not strengthen or reduce inequalities amongst older adults – it may rather legitimise the inequalities in its emphasis on individual responsibilities. These findings suggest that the active ageing approach needs to become more context-sensitive or replaced by other social policy approaches.

老年人的社会参与通常被认为是有益的，并得到欧洲积极老龄化政策的支持。然而，提高生活质量和改善老龄化体验的努力可能会增加晚年生活不平等的意外后果。本研究使用来自 SHARE 的六个波浪来说明社会参与如何随着时间的推移而发展，以及在五个欧洲福利制度的背景下，社会参与如何由教育、财务状况和健康状况构成。随着时间的推移，55 岁以上人口的参与程度略有增加，而参与这些活动及其结果的不平等现象保持稳定。所以，支持这些活动不会加强或减少老年人之间的不平等——相反，它可能会将强调个人责任的不平等合法化。这些研究结果表明，积极老龄化方法需要变得更加敏感，或者被其他社会政策方法取代。