Enabling Environment for Ageing Well: Nusbaum’s Capability Approach Applied to Housing Model

In the last thirty years, society has been facing a significant transformation that goes beyond the boundaries of countries: the global phenomenon of ageing population (UNDESA, 2022). The paradigm of the state as a provider of welfare services is restructured in a new one: the state provides opportunities that could enable people to enlarge their choice of doing and being what they consider valuable for their well-being (Stiglitz, Sen, Fitoussi, 2009). The socio-political environment certainly affects people’s freedom since it is the relational space wherein they experience human development (from the immediate environment of the proximal processes, such as home and family, to remote ones of the "societal blueprint").

The starting point of this research is the definition of adequate housing for the elderly, particularly regarding the new model of intentional community for the second half of life (Choi, 2004; Sandstedt & Westin, 2015; Sargisson, 2014; Saunders, 2016). Drawing from the ecological model and environmental gerontology, the present research adds Nussbaum’s capability approach perspective to the life environment in "relation with individual’s ability to convert [it] into valuable outcomes" (Bronfenbrenner, 1977; Nussbaum,1997; 2003; 2011). In particular, the paper will analyse how and to what extent housing models can affects the promotion of health, safety and participation opportunities for an enabling aging.