Abstract
Abstract : The contemporary demographical development and the advances in gerontology related to it have brought a natural question of measuring act ive ageing as a phenomenon and of active ageing as a process. Poetically, we talk about ageing of s ociety even though only individual beings can get older.
The Economic Commission for Europe of the Un ited Nations (UNECE) and the European Com- mission's Directorate General for Employment, Socia l Affairs and Inclusion (DG EMPL) came with the 11 idea to statistically identify areas in which count ries can promote realization an of a potential of o ld- er people by state policies and programmes. In 2012 , the Active Ageing Index (AAI) was created.
Core : AAI is based on national statistics and includes 22 indicators in four domains. Within it, there are four indicators of employment rates, voluntary activities, care to children and grandchildren, physical exercise, long-life learning, physical saf ety, using of information and communication tech- nologies, life expectancy in the age of 55, etc.
Ac cording to authors opinion, AAI may be exploited for political decisions making and for processing a nd monitoring of policies and strategies on ageing. It is said to be comprehensive and flexible at the same time.
AAI enables to examine an extent to which the potential of older people is realized. Reviewers of AAI demur first of all at inclusion or - on the contrary - an omission of some indi- cators and at their weights which go into the AAI c alculation.
Nevertheless, the matter is about so fa r the most ambitious project for measuring a level of active ageing in the international scope. Basic elements of AAI lie in the strategy of active agein g of the World Health Organisation (WHO), which is employed as a worldwide guideline for public policy of ageing and old age since 2002.
The word "ac- tive" expresses continuing participation of elderly in social, economic, cultural, spiritual and civil life areas that is in a family, a community and a whole society. Thus AAI followed in the generally ac- cepted and politically and technically relevant con cept.
Three years ago WHO approved a new strategy designa ted as healthy ageing. It is a process of developing and preserving the functional ability th at enables well-being in older age.
The functional ability includes features that are joined with the people s health so that they can be and to do what they recognize as important and valuable. It is det ermined by the intrinsic capacity of the individual (physical and mental), relevant features of the env ironment and the interaction between these.
Specific focus : Now the healthy ageing belongs to the main topics of the WHO s activities for 2015- 2030 and replaces the former conception of the acti ve ageing. So we may expect that the active ageing index (AAI) would be replaced - by its autho rs - with a healthy ageing index (HAI?), yet with a repeating of the methodological objections.