Social Transformation, The Retired College Teachers And Social Support

Our country has stepped into the population aging society since 1999, and it is one of those developing countries that stepped into the population aging society earlier. According to'The Forecast report on the population aging of china'in 2006 it showed that by the end of 2004, the old population have 143 million, in 2014 it will be 200 million, in 2026 it will achieve 300 million, in 2037 it will surpass 400 million, in 2051 the maximizing, continuously it will maintain afterwards at 300-400 million scales, the situation of the population aging is serious. But this time, China also is changing from the traditional society to the modern society, from planned economy to market economy. The double functions of social transformation and population aging strike not only the hierarchal personal support to Senior Citizens which traditionally focuses on the pedigree and blood, but also the public support to senior citizens which takes danwei as carriers in cities. Under this, social risks and the indefinable factors increase daily, the social support of the aged not only directly concerns their mind and body, but also concerns social stability and social harmony, it has caused the government and the educational world widespread attention.There are theoretical and empirical researches on social support. In empirical Research, some researchers choose the whole aged as the object of study, others look the aged as heterogeneous population, distinguish them between sex, age, city and countryside and choose a certain group as object of study. For this, the author distinguishes them between their profession which they were ever engaged in and choose the retired college teachers to investigate.There are two main causes that the researchers choose the retired college teachers to investigate. One cause is that the group has different needs compared with others, the other is that a certain institutional arrangement is reflected in them, namely about the support provided by danwei, it is value of the study on institutional changes during social transformation.The studies on social support which has been done are mainly in the view of social network and put emphasis on the structure of network, the relationship between the social roles of the members of the aged and the support provided by them, but this paper puts forward needs-support to analyze the retired college teachers' needs and what they will do in order to satisfy their needs.By the view of this paper and the problems which the author wants to research, quantitative study is not adopted, but qualitative investigation. Interviewing method is adopted in collecting materials, methods of illustration and comparative analysis are used for analysis materials.Firstly, the author makes an investigation on the retired college teachers' demand for the public support and finds that: (1) Few retired college teachers demand the physical support.(2) Some retired college teachers demand the housecraft support. (3)Most retired college teachers have the general and intense spiritual need. (4)The retired college teachers demand the support of varied information.Secondly, the author makes a further investigation on the source and ways of the public support demanded by the retiring teachers, and finds there is a popularity in the source of public support demanded by the retiring teachers, that is, the public support comes from not only the formal ways of the units, market and government, but also the informal ways of their personal lineal and collateral consanguinity, neighbors, colleagues and friends. At the same time, different public support given to the retiring teachers by different social relationship also represents different characteristics.There are three operation strategies and approaches for obtaining such social support. (1)Self-support network. It is one of the operation strategies that depends on themselves rather than turned to others. When they need help, they always fall back on themselves; (2) core-support network. Most of interviewees take advantage of core-support network in time of need. It is one of the operation strategies that resorts to Intimate informal relationships, for example, family relationship, intimate friendship etc, when they get into troubles; (3) expanding-support network. Except for above-mentioned operation strategies and approaches, many a interviewee gets their help through expanding-support network. expanding-support network based on core-support network.. In real life, we have not only core-support network connected by Intimate informal relationships, but also have indirect network connected by ordinary kindred, formal relationship and so on. The two networks interweave a expanding-support network..The author also explores the support provided by danwei. Result shows that the support function of danwei is weakening in the period of social transformation, but it still lives in a key position.At last, it is necessary for the retired college teachers that establish a multi-inter-grated social-supporting system with the community as the carrier, whether their needs or the tendency of social development. But by the dependent complex of danwei, it is a far-flung course.