Introduction

In Spring 2023 I was lucky to have the opportunity to take two months off ‘normal’ work for a Churchill Fellowship to explore intergenerational relationships. Here’s a introduction to what I set out in search of, and why.

Why intergenerational relationships?

My interest in intergenerational relationships is personally motivated, as much as it can be justified on an intellectual or theoretical basis.

The relationships I’ve had across generations - both within and outside of my family - have brought huge value and meaning to my life. As a kid who was pushed around the playground by bullies for a decade it was my relationship with my mum’s best friend which got me through some of my toughest times. As founder of the Jo Cox Foundation it was my relationship with women decades older and younger than me which helped me navigate not only my own grief but to make meaning out of other people’s grief.

This personal experience has led to an intellectual curiosity: why is it that my friends and peers don’t routinely experience these types of relationship? Am I a relational anomaly in a wider context of generational disconnection and apathy?

In his excellent book, ‘Generations’, Bobby Duffy set out to get beyond the headlines to interrogate the causes and effects of the present day’s so-called ‘generational divides’. Does our age and generation create some innate conditions for our actions, behaviours and crucially our relationships with one another? Or are our generational relations being shaped by more than just where we fall in the generational cohorts?

What lies beneath our social divides?

One part of what lies beneath generational disconnection is an underlying economic reality. Home ownership for young people in the UK has halved since the 1980s. Meanwhile older people own the wealth — housing and pensions. This is both cause and effect of the alarming lack of interaction and integration between generations.

Data shows people of different ages are living side by side and seldom interacting, or increasingly in entirely different postcodes and regions all together. Children now have a mere 5% chance of having someone aged over 65 living in their area compared to a 15% chance in 1991, while the level of segregation between retirees and young adults has roughly doubled during the same period. This segregation is reflected in our relationships: we are less likely than ever before to have any sort of relationship — close friend or remote acquaintance — with someone from a different generation outside of our family unit. And of course these divisions are reflected in our democracy: over-65s were more than twice as likely as under-25s to have voted to leave the European Union.

Alongside these economic, social and political realities is the increasingly precarious landscape on top of which we live our lives. As a middle-class kid of the 1990s, I grew up surrounded by stories of the end of history and the promise of modernity’s climax (I highly recommend this BBC radio documentary on this topic). The past 20 years have been a rude awakening, especially for those whose experiences are marked with considerably more marginalisation and exploitation than mine. The world is becoming increasingly and existentially precarious: climate chaos rages, violence is breaking through in real life and online, threats such as AI and nuclear power loom large over our present and future lives.

In the end, Bobby Duffy concluded that while natural ageing, the events we live through and the impacts of our generational peers all impact on who we are and how we think, it is in fact generational contact, or lack there of, that has a significant and underestimated impact on our actions and opinions. It is intergenerational isolation that creates the conditions for mistrust of others and increased fear and anxiety about situations that would bring us into contact. 

At a deep level we all feel under threat and at risk, and this is inducing further psychological distress. Our instinctive, primal response in this context is to withdraw and disconnect. This is a reality in which good relationships – trusting, loving, value-creating, solidarity-inducing relationships – can be harder and harder to realise within and beyond our family, friends and community networks.

Are we entering generational free fall?

On all this logic it appears we are free-falling through a downward spiral of disconnection. Generational inequality and segregation is the fertile ground on which it’s possible to foment intergenerational conflict.

Like all divisions, intergenerational division weakens the fabric of society that can be a crucial part of us leading healthy, happy lives where we trust one another, we have faith in our institutions, we are supported by and support those around us, and are active participants in democracy fuelled by a belief in our own agency and contribution.

There is a critical need to redress the economic inequalities that underpin intergenerational tension. But that won’t happen – or at least not quickly or effectively enough – without intergenerational solidarity unleashed by stronger relationships and greater understanding across generational divides. How else are we going to meet and overcome the complex intersecting environmental, social and political poly-crisis we all face if it’s not standing shoulder to shoulder across generations? And this is what I was excited to have the opportunity to explore through this Fellowship.