Abstract

My work explores the opportunities that ageing actively offers at the individual and collective levels, focusing my analysis on older adults (aged 65–74) engaged in voluntary activities in third-sector organizations. To outline the social role played by elder volunteers in Italy, I performed synthetic indexes and a cluster analysis (with SPAD software) on a stratified randomized sample, representative of the Italian active older adults aged 65–74 years (N=146) engaged in pro-social activities in third-sector organizations. The analyses show that in providing aid to others these active elders establish a strong support network for themselves. I have also found that Italian third-sector organizations are intergenerational in terms of co-existence of young, adult, and elderly volunteers, which contributes to the well-being of all the stakeholders involved. Coming together on a regular basis stimulates the activation of behavioral, material, interpersonal, and communicative resources. Volunteering in later life is associated with reinforcement of self-fulfillment and formation of one’s social identity. Furthermore, thick networks of social relations at the micro and meso (i.e., community) levels facilitate older people’s inclusion in voluntary work.