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2012届英文翻译

题 目: 论养老服务中的地方政府职能

目 录

英文原文 2

IntroductionCommunity Services for the Aged The View from Eight Countries 2

中文译文 13

社区养老服务：八个国家的观点 13

英文原文

Community Services for the Aged :The View from Eight Countries

Caring for the aged is a concern of all industrialized countries be they socialist, capitalist, or mixed economies. Using different words, with variations in emphasis, the eight countries covered in a recently completed cross-national study of social services reported an almost unanimous rationale for their growing concern for the aged and for the expanding social provision. First are the demographic changes which are occurring everywhere. More people are living longer.Declining birth rates and increased longevity have led to the present situation of high percentages of aged in all these countries.Second, social and economic trends have contributed to creating a social problem out of a normal process. Older workers may be defined as nonproductive or too expensive to retrain, or redundant, as technological changes lead to reductions in certain categories of workers. Society pressures for earlier retirement. At the same time, with increased physical mobility, children are less likely to live near elderly parents; and as more women work, there are fewer daughters at home to care for those parents living nearby. Constrained by inadequate resources, the aged must cope with more extensive periods of enforced retirement, greater likelihood of isolation, and increased needs as time passes.

In addition to the emergence of the aged as a numerically important group with expanding needs and problems, the aged are becoming increasingly politicized. In many countries they vote, they are articulate, and they are beginning to organize as an independent political constituency. Thus, countries are responding to the needs of the aged because they have influence and power. Using the United Nations criterion for describing countries as young if their aged population is equal to 4% or less of the total population, 'adult' when the aged represent 4-7%, and 'old' when the aged equal 7% or more, all the countries covered here are 'old.' However, like the aged themselves, this is a heterogeneous group of countries ranging from the 'young-old' (Israel 7.3%; Yugoslavia, 7.8%; Canada, 8.0%; Poland, 8.5%); to the 'old-old' (UK, 13%; France, 13.1%; FRC, 13.5%) with the USA at approximately the mid-point (10%).The percentage of aged is still increasing in all these countries. Those with the largest percentage anticipate reaching a plateau of about 13- 15% in the mid or late 1980s. The others will follow.

Some countries recognized the needs of their aged earlier, but all those described here evinced a rapidly growing concern beginning after World War II and culminating by the late 1960s or 1970s as the 'younger' countries also undertook deliberate efforts to address the problem.

In what follows in this cross-national overview of community services for the aged, fourbull;issues will be addressed: (1) the context in which services for the aged are provided in each country; (2) the similarities in defining need and developing responsive national policies and programs; (3) the differences among countries; and (4) the service delivery system and the search for a new model.

Community Services for the Aged: The Cross National Context

Cross-national comparisons are always difficult—and may be dangerous unless done carefully. Comparing community services for the aged in eight countries involves all the usual problems: differences in definition,availability of data, aggregation and dis-aggregation of data; questions of validity and reliability. To minimize such problems, the methodology followed in this study was country, case-descriptive. Thus, the focus was on the totality of policies and programs designed to assist old people who are physically or socially isolated and need some kind of help. Information was to be provided by researchers in each participating country regarding: laws;benefits and services; costs, expenditures and fees; eligibility, coverage and utilization patterns. The country responses inevitably covered every domain —income maintenance,health, housing, employment, and personal social services.

Two major conclusions emerged, to be discussed in greater detail subsequently: (1)there is a clear consensus that community services for the aged must be embedded in a firm infrastructure of basic provision (in particular, income, medical care, housing) if they are to have any real value to aged individuals; and (2) there is a core of personal social services4 that can be identified internationally, that are significant for old people in need of help.

To assure international comparability an arbitrary, chronological definition of old age was employed: all those aged 65 and over. From a social policy perspective this was an error. Indeed, although the parameters of the cohort vary among countries, the only functionally comparable criterion is 'pensionable age,' usually, but not always, 65 for men and 60 for women. Clearly the critical age for the whole demographic category in countries where social insurance is institutionalized—as it is in all indust

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