European Pensions & Global Finance

This book is about the demographic and funding crises that threaten continental European systems of pension and retirement income. The author argues that state-sponsored social security will not deliver promised retirement incomes for the baby-boom generation; European monetary union and the imperatives of global finance has made such promises untenable thereby undercutting nation-state social solidarity. Globalization has set many challenges for European countries not least of which is providing pension security for theory citizens. At the same time, global finance has opened-up options for corporations and individuals seeking alternatives to the past; but exercising those opportunities will come at a high cost for European notions of social justice.

Gordon L. Clark is the Halford Mackinder Professor of Geography, Fellow of the Said Business School, and Research Fellow of the Institute of Ageing at the University of Oxford, and is a Fellow of St Peter's College, Oxford. He is a member of the Panel of Academic Experts of the UK National Association of Pension Funds and a Governor of the Pensions Policy Institute.