Western modern societies are changing going along with new ways of life, different age compositions and increasing shares of migrants. Simultaneously, all across Europe we see a withdrawal of welfare states. These changes affect relationships between generations and cultures, and social support. Especially marginalized groups such as migrants and older people are adversely affected. The planned symposium comprises of four presentations on social networks and social support of older migrants in Europe.

She develops a typology of Turkish late-life stayer and migrant families using multiple dimensions of intergenerational solidarity based on a “binational” and “dissimilation” perspective comparison: (1) Do relationships […] reflect the patterns prevalent in the origin context, indicating mechanisms of ethnic retention, or do they show migration-specific adjustments in terms of dissimilation? (2) Do relationship patterns […] differ across the European countries, suggesting impacts of macro-context factors? First results suggest strong Turkish family ties with intense contact, intergenerational exchange of advice and support and high normative solidarity. Little evidence appears of dissimilation from the context of origin. Most remarkably, attitudes seem to change to a larger extent than behavior.

Contrary to initial expectations, many EU citizens who arrived in the UK after 2004 have not been temporary and transient but rather have extended their stay and shown signs of settling in. Based on in-depth interviews with Polish migrants in London, this paper examines opportunities but also obstacles that migrants face in negotiating belonging and attachment in local contexts. In so doing, the paper aims to understand the processes and mechanisms that enable and hinder settling into particular places.

Migration scholars frequently discuss intra-EU migration in terms of circularity, temporariness and liquidity (Collett, 2013). As a result there has been less academic discussion of how European migrants negotiate attachment and belonging (Erdal and Oeppen, 2013) and how these may be gendered. I use the concept of ‘embedding’ (Ryan and Mulholland, 2015) to explore the multi-layered and dynamic processes of negotiating identifications and attachments spatially and temporally.

In particular, I focus on networks of care and examine the gender dimensions of place-effects to understand how men and women mediate inter-generational caring relationships through time and place. For example, caring for children in London, while simultaneously caring about ageing parents in Poland can lead to dilemmas and tensions in the migration trajectory. In this way, I present migrant ‘embedding’ as an emplaced and embodied, gendered process.

Lea Ellwardt focusses on “Which types of non-kin networks relate to survival in late adulthood? A latent-class approach”. She investigates the association between older adults’ survival rates and integration into different types of non-kin networks. Respondents are classified into distinct types of non-kin networks, based on differences in number of non-kin, social support received from non-kin and contact frequency with non-kin. Membership in network types is next related to mortality. Four latent types of non-kin networks differ in their associations with mortality, independent of socio-demographic and health confounders. Older adults integrated into networks high in both amount and variation of supportive non-kin contacts have higher chances of survival than older adults embedded in networks low in either amount or variation, or both. Measurements on the first migrant cohort will be provided in the near future.

Finally, Martina Brandt, Judith Kaschowitz and Jennifer Klöckner broach the issue of “migration, social networks and social support across life course”. Using the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) they examine social support networks among natives and immigrants (Turkish, Greek, Italian, Yugoslavian, Rumanian, Polish, Russian and migrants from the former Soviet Union). They focus on changes of social relationships and social support over life course attributing this to the context of country of origin and cohorts. First results show significant inter-ethnic and inter-generational differences of social capital and social support. In contrast to shares of relatives, migrant networks vary stronger by amounts of fellow natives: Turkish migrants integrate more persons of the same origin into their networks than other migrants, but less than Germans. Polish and Rumanian networks consist of most Germans. Further, network compositions are rather inter-generationally than ethnically determined. Second generation networks comprise of less relatives, less migrants of the same origin and more Germans. Nevertheless, Yugoslavian generations differ less than Turkish, Greek, and Italian. Further, Turks and Greeks significantly name family members as supposed caregivers more often but mention professional caregivers less often than Germans and other migrants (2001 and 2006). Expectations of social support by family members are likewise affected by country of origin. Hence, different needs of social support in life course and diverse ways of compensating deprivation by nation are expected.