Dialectics of aging: class struggle and the social production of old age

Abstract

This article performs a literature review to analyze the dialectics of the right to grow old in capitalist society, highlighting the contradiction between formal legal protection and the material reality of exploitation faced by the working class. Grounded in the historical-dialectical method and critical social theory, the study problematizes old age not as a universal biological destiny, but as a social production determined by class division and the centrality of labor. It discusses the transition of aging from the private sphere to the public stage, where longevity, despite being a civilizing achievement, is paradoxically treated by hegemonic discourse as an economic and fiscal threat. It examines neoliberal counter-reforms and the financialization of old age, processes that convert rights into commodities and deepen social lack of protection. It concludes that the full guarantee of dignity and overcoming the condition of being superfluous to capital require the horizon of human emancipation today.