867594

research-article2019
CSP0010.1177/0261018319867594Critical Social PolicyButton and Ncapai

Critical
Social
Policy

Article

Conflict and negotiation in

intergenerational care: Older
women’s experiences of caring
with the Old Age Grant in South
Africa

Kirsty Button
T h oba n i Nca p a i
University of Cape Town, South Africa

Abstract
Social policy and welfare provision have converged with socio-economic
conditions, cultural beliefs about kin support and intra-household dynam-
ics to position older women as important financial providers in their
families. This article draws on the findings of a qualitative study about
intergenerational relationships of care in a large township near Cape
Town. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with fourteen female
Old Age Grant recipients and some of their co-resident adult children.
The article focuses on the grant recipients’ experiences of giving and
receiving financial support (‘financial care’) in their intergenerational
relationships. It also unpacks the intra-household dynamics involved in
this caregiving. Although the grant better enabled the women in the
study to meet the needs of their households, beliefs about the mutual

Corresponding author:
Kirsty Button, Centre for Social Sciences Research, University of Cape Town, Room 4.89, Leslie Social
Science Building, 12 University Avenue, Rondebosch, 7701, South Africa.
Email: bttkir001@myuct.ac.za

Critical Social Policy 2019, Vol. 39(4): 560–581

© The Author(s) 2019 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/0261018319867594 journals.sagepub.com/home/csp
https://doi.org/10.1177/0261018319867594
Button and Ncapai 561

and shared responsibility for financial caregiving in families informed

their expectations of financial assistance from younger kin. When their
co-resident younger relatives did earn an income, negotiations around
the provision of financial care ensued; generating conflict and reflecting
unequal power relations between relatives. These dynamics contributed
to the women’s experiences of vulnerability and their high burden of
care. In this context, the article examines the state’s role in the care
process and how it has contributed to the gendered and generational
distribution of care work in families.

Key words
financial support, intergenerational relationships, social assistance,
Ubuntu, welfare policy

Introduction

Social welfare policy and provision have shaped intergenerational relation-

ships of care; by upholding traditional divisions of care work within fami-
lies and by interacting with broader socio-economic and cultural dynamics
in South Africa. Research has shown that in a context of widespread poverty
and unemployment, women use the Old Age Grant (OAG) to support their
younger relatives; that is, they are ‘financial caregivers’ in their families (Kim-
muna and Makiwane, 2007; Schatz, 2007; Schatz and Ogunmefun, 2007;
Bak, 2008; Mosoetsa, 2011; Sidloyi, 2016). Despite this expansive body of
research, less is known about the experiences of negotiation and conflict that
may accompany this caregiving. This article discusses the findings of a quali-
tative study about intergenerational relationships of care in a large township
on the outskirts of Cape Town, and seeks to contribute to a fuller understand-
ing of how older women experience financial caregiving in their families.
The findings highlight that the OAG better enabled the women in the
study to care for their under- and unemployed children and grandchildren.
However, intergenerational negotiation, conflict and inequality formed part
of their experiences of financial caregiving. The women rejected the idea that
the OAG made them solely responsible for the financial care of their house-
holds and they expected their younger, co-resident kin to share this respon-
sibility when they had the means to do so. Although their younger relatives
shared these beliefs about financial caregiving, the women struggled to claim
assistance from them when they earned an income. Conflict about the use
of earnings and the prioritisation of household needs over personal needs
accompanied these negotiations for care. That younger relatives could contest
and resist the claims made on their earnings highlights the unequal power
562 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

relations in their households. Furthermore, these intra-household dynamics

exacerbated the OAG recipients’ vulnerabilities and burden of care.
Drawing on a political ethic of care, the article examines how the state,
through social policy and welfare provision, has played a role in the care pro-
cess and how it has contributed to the distribution of care work in families.
Following this, it is argued that as older women receive care from the state
and in turn use the OAG to care for their families, the state should be more
attentive and responsive to the women’s experiences of financial caregiving.
It goes on to unpack what some of the implications of this attentiveness and
responsiveness may look like.

Ubuntu and a political ethic of care

This article considers ‘care’ as a practice, standard and moral disposition,

encompassing all the culturally defined activities that ‘maintain, continue
and repair’ our world (Tronto, 1993: 103). Furthermore, using Tronto’s
(1993) widely cited conceptualisation of care, care is understood as compris-
ing four interconnected phases (caring about, taking care of, caregiving and
care-receiving), each corresponding to a moral value (attentiveness, responsi-
bility, competence and responsiveness, respectively).
Writing on the concept in the South African context, scholars have high-
lighted that care is central to Ubuntu; an African philosophy of communi-
tarianism (Gouws and Van Zyl, 2014; 2015). Ubuntu embodies the idea that
people are interconnected and that relationships are based on interdependence
and mutual respect (Gouws and Van Zyl, 2015: 173). From this perspec-
tive, care is relational, non-stigmatised and fundamental in human wellbeing
and relationships (Gouws and Van Zyl, 2014: 108). Importantly, Gouws and
Van Zyl (2015) distinguish between ‘Ubuntu-talk’ and ‘Ubuntu-do’. Although
Ubuntu-talk may embody values of equality and dignity in caregiving, this
may not translate into practice in contexts of social inequality. They argue
that a critical perspective of care is thus also necessary so that inequalities in
care can be understood and challenged.
Following from this, the article also draws on a political ethic of care
which recognises that care is shaped by unequal power relations in families
and society (Gouws and Van Zyl, 2014).
While care work is often relegated to the private sphere and devalued, the
responsibility for care work is unequally distributed along gender, race, class
and age hierarchies (Tronto, 1993). As Bozalek (2014: 60) argued, a politi-
cal ethic of care questions ‘the distribution of caregiving work in society, the
relations of power which affect this work and are affected by it, and the sorts
of practices engaged in to ensure the care of dependants'.
Button and Ncapai 563

Contextualising older women’s intergenerational

relationships of care

The post-apartheid state has adopted a predominantly familalist notion of

care in social policy. The 1996 White Paper on Social Welfare and the 2012
White Paper on Families in South Africa espouse neoliberal ideas of foster-
ing economic self-reliance while emphasising the family as the primary site
of care for vulnerable individuals (Sevenhuijsen et  al., 2003; Button et  al.,
2018). Furthermore, by not accounting for the gendered and generational
burden of care in the private sphere, it upholds these divisions of care work
in families (Sevenhuijsen et al., 2003). Importantly, the state has positioned
itself as ‘facilitating’ and ‘supporting’ caregiving in families, rather than
meeting needs for care directly (Sevenhuijsen et al., 2003: 203; Button et al.,
2018: 605). Through non-contributory, means-tested social grants, the state
provides financial resources to the elderly, disabled and caregivers of children.
In the absence of support from the state, able-bodied unemployed working-
age adults, in contrast, are largely excluded from the social safety net (Klasen
and Woolard, 2009).
This article focuses on recipients of the OAG. Payable to individuals over
the age of 60, the OAG provides 70 percent of the elderly, most of whom are
black South Africans, with a comparatively large and secure income (equiva-
lent to US$135 per month) (Statistics South Africa, 2017). Although older
people have historically been caregivers in their families, intergenerational
relationships of care have been reshaped in the contemporary period. Wide-
spread poverty and unemployment, marginal social assistance for the unem-
ployed, HIV/AIDS-related illnesses and deaths, declining marriage rates, the
decoupling of motherhood from marriage, and, entrenched and new patterns
of labour migration have contributed to the financial, practical and personal
needs for care among children and prime-age adults (see also article by Moore
and Seekings in this issue). Older kin have, through the OAG, been posi-
tioned to address some of these needs for care. Indeed, research shows the
redistributive quality of the OAG, which has reduced poverty and improved
the economic stability of grant recipients’ households (Case and Deaton,
1998; Burns et al., 2005; Ferreira, 2006).
Older women, however, seem to bear a larger share of this care work.
Research in urban and rural areas has pointed specifically to women who use
their OAGs and other resources to meet their younger relatives’ care needs
(Kimuna and Makiwane, 2007; Schatz, 2007; Schatz and Ogunmefun, 2007;
Bak, 2008; Mosoetsa, 2011; Sidloyi, 2016). While limited research exists on
how men use the OAG, studies suggest that OAGs received by women, rather
than men, translate into spending more on food and less on transportation,
alcohol and tobacco (Case and Deaton, 1998), while also improving child
nutrition (Duflo, 2003). However, research has shown that school attendance
564 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

improved and child labour declined in households where men neared OAG-
eligibility, which may highlight the positive impact that anticipating an
OAG may have in male recipients’ households (Edmonds, 2006).
Gendered differences in older people’s living arrangements also reflect
older women as important caregivers in their families. In 2015, 43% of men
compared to 13% of women lived in nuclear households, whereas nearly 70%
of women versus 40% of men lived in extended households (Statistics South
Africa, 2017). Furthermore, with declining marriage rates, women’s longer
life expectancy and improved economic independence, female headship is
increasing (Posel and Rogan, 2009). Instead of residing with partners, many
older women live with younger kin and head multigenerational households
(Posel, 2001; Dungumaro, 2008). Female headship has been associated with
age, financial provision and decision-making (Posel, 2001). These households
are important sites of financial and practical care; being larger and contain-
ing more dependents (unemployed adults, children, ill and disabled kin) than
their male counterparts (Dungumaro, 2008).
Scholars have sought to explain the gendered and generational divi-
sions of care provision in families. Through the institutionalisation of the
male migrant labour system, the apartheid regime interacted with African
power structures to entrench ‘extreme’ gendered divisions of care work in
families (Bak, 2008: 385). Financial provision became an important marker
of manhood while womanhood was closely tied with unpaid care work within
households. However, while poverty and unemployment have undermined
traditional masculinities, it has reinforced the importance of women’s finan-
cial and practical caregiving in ensuring the survival of their households
(Mosoetsa, 2011). Mosoetsa (2011) conducted research on poor households in
KwaZulu-Natal and highlighted the gendered divisions in household resource
provision. Although the precise proportion of men, compared to women, who
provide care is unknown, Mosoetsa (2011) found that women were expected
to care for their families with their financial resources, while men did not
always do the same. Men often cited tradition as entitling them to personal,
discretionary spending (2011: 67). Whereas younger women challenged these
patriarchal norms, older women seemed to accept this burden of care, viewing
it as an extension of their roles as mothers (2011: 69).
Social welfare has thus converged with socio-economic and cultural
dynamics to shape intergenerational care. Moreover, in silently upholding
traditional divisions of care work in families, the state has, through social
policy and welfare provision, arguably entrenched older women’s positions as
financial caregivers in their families. Two other sets of dynamics are impor-
tant when considering older women’s caregiving roles.
Firstly, research has highlighted the importance of African kinship sys-
tems in understanding care provision between relatives. Sagner and Mtati
(1999: 400) described African kinship as a moral order, structured around
Button and Ncapai 565

generalised reciprocity, that involved mutual obligations of support between

kin. Research shows that older people assume responsibility for and meet
the care needs of their younger relatives in recognition of these obligations
(Sagner and Mtati, 1999; Schatz and Ogunmefun, 2007; Hoffman, 2016).
Additionally, they expect care to be reciprocated when a younger relative
earns an income (Bohman et  al., 2009; Hoffman, 2016). Embodying the
value of interdependence, these perceptions of kin support intertwine with
the ethos of Ubuntu.
Secondly, although these care relationships were once considered binding
and inescapable, scholars now recognise that relatives with unequal power
relations and different preferences have space to ‘negotiate’ which needs for
care should be met, how and by whom (Finch and Mason, 1993; Seekings,
2008). Little research exists on this topic in South Africa. As such, our under-
standing of intergenerational relationships of care and the role older women
play in these, is incomplete. Some research suggests that younger adults have
contested their older relatives’ expectations of financial and practical caregiv-
ing. Mosoetsa (2011) found that when daughters had access to an income,
many challenged their parents’ gendered expectations of unpaid labour and
financial provision. Mathis (2011) reported that young women spoke of
themselves as rights-bearing individuals to limit their financial obligations
towards their parents. This research may point to intergenerational negotia-
tions over caregiving.
Power relations, and the control of productive resources and wealth, were
traditionally based on an intersection of gender, age and lineage in African
kinship systems (Carton, 2000; Aboderin, 2006). Additionally, old age has
been associated with wisdom, authority and social standing (Møller and Sot-
shongaye, 2002). The above mentioned contestations may point to shifting
power relations in families. If negotiations over resources for financial care
take place, how do older women experience these? Do their seniority and
economic status help ensure that their expectations of financial care are met
by younger kin? What impact does this have on the burden of care in their
households? This article draws on the findings of a study about female OAG
recipients’ experiences of intergenerational care to provide a fuller under-
standing of these dynamics.

Methodology

A qualitative study was conducted to explore intergenerational relationships

of care in households headed by female OAG recipients. Fourteen house-
holds, all located in a township on the outskirts of Cape Town, formed part
of the study. The research, which was approved through an institutional eth-
ics review process, examined how financial and non-monetary resources were
566 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

used across generations of household members to provide financial and practi-

cal care. This article focuses on the OAG recipients’ experiences of financial
caregiving.
As elaborated upon below, the first author was an outsider in the field-
work setting, relying on the second author, who is an experienced researcher,
activist and long-time resident of the research site. Together we carried out
the fieldwork on which this article is based.
We initially used a sampling frame to identify female OAG beneficiaries
who headed households in the research area. This was replaced with snowball
sampling, as some of the women introduced Thobani and I to their neighbours
and relatives and this became a more successful way of meeting potential par-
ticipants. We approached the women with information about the research
and advised them of the voluntary, anonymous and confidential nature of
their participation. Based on this, fourteen women provided their informed
consent to participate in the research and semi-structured interviews were
conducted with them at their homes. After asking the women for permission
to approach one of their co-resident adult children or grandchildren, the same
process was followed in recruiting younger participants to the study. We con-
ducted interviews with a co-resident younger adult in six of the households.
Most participants opted to speak isiXhosa, their first language, in their
interviews. As the first author was not fluent in isiXhosa, the second author
translated interview exchanges and helped both the participants and the first
author to navigate the interview experience. Button (2016) discusses the
challenges that accompanied these language barriers. A two-stage thematic
analysis of the interview transcripts was carried out to generate the research
findings. Household-level analyses were used to understand the range of expe-
riences related to care provision in each household. Thereafter, a compara-
tive analysis was conducted to compare these experiences across the sample.
Pseudonyms are used in the discussion of the findings to protect the partici-
pants’ identities and care has been taken to omit the disclosure of other infor-
mation that could otherwise identify them.
We had to navigate various challenges in doing this fieldwork. Not only
is speaking to strangers about family matters frowned upon under isiXhosa
custom, but the positionality of the first author in the fieldwork setting made
this more difficult. As a young, white South African woman from a middle-
class background, who does not have children of her own and who speaks lim-
ited isiXhosa, she was often considered an outsider by the participants. The
second author drew on his fieldwork experience and his knowledge as a ‘cul-
tural insider’ to help create spaces in which the participants felt comfortable
talking to us about their family lives. The first author also tried to convey her
desire to learn from the participants, as experts in their own lived experiences.
While it often felt easier to build rapport with the younger participants,
given our similarities in age and their preference for speaking English, some
Button and Ncapai 567

of the OAG recipients seemed to enjoy the interview process, describing it as

an opportunity for them to unload and be listened to. Nonetheless, the out-
sider position of the first author was never forgotten by the participants. Our
differences, and the unequal power relations between us, were highlighted in
unexpected ways during the fieldwork. The first author was asked if she could
employ some of the OAG recipients as domestic workers and if she could
restore to its former glory a building that once was a childcare centre. These
requests were made directly to the first author in English, as opposed to both
of us, and they were difficult to navigate and had to be declined as sensitively
as possible, based on a concern for the ethical and personal boundaries these
may have crossed. The first author also tried to explain that, although she was
a mlungu (‘white person’), as a student, she did not have the resources to meet
these requests. One of her regrets about the study is that she did not pursue
the second request further. These dilemmas also put the second author in an
uncomfortable and difficult position during these exchanges. These experi-
ences, although also difficult to write about, reflect some of the moral dilem-
mas that can arise from one’s positionality in the field. They also highlight
how the participants perceived the relatively powerful position of the first
author within and beyond the research setting and how we were all forced to
confront the power relations involved in the research relationship.
The study has several limitations. Given the first author’s outsider posi-
tionality, the accounts presented here may not fully reflect the nuances of
the participants’ experiences. Additionally, the language barriers discussed
above impacted the richness of the data. There are also voices missing from
the accounts presented below. Time constraints and difficulties recruiting
younger participants (see Button, 2016) meant that not all younger kin in the
households in the sample were interviewed and this data is not as detailed as
that of the OAG recipients.

Description of the participants and their

households

As mentioned above, the research discussed in this article was conducted in

a large township that is located near Cape Town. Owing to the country’s
legacy of racial discrimination and segregation, it is still predominantly home
to black South African residents. Poverty is widespread, with most residents
falling in the lowest income quintiles in the city (Seekings, 2013).
All the participants in the study were black South Africans. The OAG
recipients ranged between the ages of 60 and 84 and, like many residents
in the area, were born in the Eastern Cape. Few had completed secondary
schooling. All except three women were married but later widowed or sepa-
rated from their husbands. Through these experiences, they migrated to Cape
568 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

Town from the 1980s, were employed as domestic workers and used their
earnings to establish their households. They form part of approximately 40%
of households in the township that are female-headed (Seekings, 2013). The
six younger participants, three women and three men, were between 22 and
32 years of age and were the OAG recipients’ children and grandchildren. All
were unmarried and had children of their own living with them. While most
had completed high school, they all had difficulty accessing tertiary education
and securing permanent employment.
The households varied in their composition. Four of the households were
made up of the OAG beneficiary and her minor grandchild. The remaining
ten were multigenerational; ranging from three to nine residents (the OAG
recipient, and one or more of her adult children and grandchildren). Of these
larger households, four contained ‘stably’ employed younger adults (referred
to as ‘SEYA households’). All women, they worked in manufacturing, domes-
tic work and hospitality on a low-wage, part-time basis. However, they were
considered stably employed as they had been in these jobs for over a year.
The remaining six households also contained younger adults, but none were
in stable employment (referred to as ‘NOSEYA households). Instead, they
moved in and out of low-paid employment on an ad hoc basis.

The OAG recipients’ experiences of financial

caregiving

The following sections discuss how the OAG recipients in the study experi-
enced financial caregiving in their intergenerational relationships. The find-
ings have been divided into four interrelated parts, with the aim of untangling
various aspects of these caregiving experiences. The first two sections locate
the women’s roles as financial caregivers in a broader social welfare, socio-eco-
nomic and cultural context. The first section unpacks how the women were
not only care-receivers from the state but also how they were positioned as
financial caregivers in their households through welfare provision, socio-eco-
nomic conditions and cultural beliefs. The next section examines more closely
perceptions about the responsibility for financial caregiving within families.
The OAG recipients and the younger participants agreed that financial care-
giving should be a reciprocal and collective responsibility that younger kin
should share when earning an income. The third and fourth sections high-
light the lived experiences of this caregiving. Perceptions about the collective
responsibility for financial caregiving did not always translate into practice.
Instead, this care often involved negotiation, conflict and inequality. These
intra-household dynamics contributed to the vulnerabilities and burden of
care experienced by the OAG recipients in the study.
Button and Ncapai 569

The OAG recipients as care-receivers and caregivers

In receiving the OAG, the women were both care-receivers from the state
and caregivers to their co-resident kin. As care-receivers, they described the
OAG as a crucial resource; it not only reduced their financial insecurity but
strengthened their agency in other aspects of their lives. For example, the
OAG gave Olivia (66) the financial independence to determine her living
arrangements and avoid the perceived insecurities of romantic relationships:

I am feeling much better now because each month I expect that I am going to
get an Old Age Grant. At the end of the day, if you have a relationship, once
that person is tired, he’s going to say: 'Get out of my house!' It’s fine now. I am
staying with my children and I am surviving.

However, many women expressed that they were under continual strain as the
primary breadwinners in their households. A historical legacy of impoverish-
ment and disadvantage meant that their children and grandchildren had dif-
ficulty accessing tertiary education. This impeded their employment in a job
market which emphasised white-collar qualifications. Consequently, unem-
ployment was common. When employment was found, it was frequently low-
paid and on a part-time or ad hoc basis. Furthermore, in the absence of state
assistance for the unemployed, younger kin were often financial dependents
rather than providers in their households.
In this context, the OAG recipients were ‘financial caregivers’ to their
younger kin. The term ‘financial caregiving’ is commonly used to describe the
provision of ‘money management assistance’; where one person helps another
to manage his or her finances (Plander, 2013: 18). However, it is used here
to mean the provision of financial support from one person to another. Fur-
thermore, drawing on Tronto’s (1993) conceptualisation of care, the term
‘financial caregiving’ is used to denote and make sense of the phases and
moral values of care that may underlie financial support. For the OAG recipi-
ents, providing ‘financial care’ to their younger kin involved more than the
provision of financial resources. Firstly, the women ‘cared about’ and were
attentive to their children and grandchildren’s needs for financial support;
they recognised the existence of these needs and resolved that they should
be met. Moreover, they assumed responsibility for addressing these needs.
Tronto (1993: 133) noted that notions of responsibility are contextual. It is
argued here that, for the OAG recipients, this assumption of responsibility
was informed by an evaluation of their younger relatives’ care needs in a con-
text of high unemployment. Additionally, perceived obligations of kin sup-
port underlay their sense of responsibility for their younger kin. Resonating
with existing research, the women expressed that a reciprocal relationship of
570 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

care existed between them and their younger kin and that even if it stretched
them financially, ‘good’ (grand)mothers took care of their (grand)children in
need (Sagner and Mtati, 1999; Schatz and Ogunmefun, 2007; Bohman et al.,
2009). Many alluded to these perceived care obligations:

I am supposed to share my money because there is no other [income] . . . You

are supposed to take care of them because you can’t throw your son or daughter
away (Mongoli, 84).

The women also directly met these needs for care by translating their financial
resources into consumables (groceries and electricity) and non-consumables
(funeral insurance) that helped to ensure the wellbeing of their households.
Here, giving financial support to their household members also became inter-
twined with the provision of practical care by, for example, shopping for gro-
ceries and preparing meals. As illustrated by Mongoli (84), this work required
considerable planning and effort, especially when resources became scarcer
during the month:

I have to sit down and use my common sense and think: 'What am I going to
cook today?' Especially at this time of the month, you are supposed to sit down
and think because there is nothing in the cupboards.

As care-receivers, the younger participants acknowledged the importance of

the care provided by the OAG recipients. This was expressed with the senti-
ment that they fulfilled the roles traditionally associated with both mothers
and fathers, namely unpaid care work and breadwinning.
Although the OAG recipients had personal needs for care, these were
not directly expressed during their interviews. In speaking about how their
grants were used, many reflected that the OAG barely covered the household
essentials. Even the proceeds from informal rotational savings groups were
used to cover larger household expenses; renovations, furniture and grocer-
ies for special occasions. This may suggest that the needs of their households
superseded spending on their personal needs.
These findings highlight how the social grant system provided financial
resources to some household members but not others. In a setting of high
unemployment and poverty, this welfare provision shaped the needs for care
in the households in the study and positioned the OAG recipients as capable
of meeting these needs. Additionally, the state’s familialist notion of care
and its implicit maintenance of traditional divisions of care work within the
private sphere have converged with perceived obligations of kin support and
high levels of unemployment to entrench the women as key financial caregiv-
ers in their households.
Button and Ncapai 571

Perceptions about financial caregiving as a joint

responsibility
As mentioned above, the OAG recipients believed that care between relatives
should be reciprocal. Following from this, the women expected their younger kin
to be attentive to the needs of their households when employment was found and
perceived that they should share the responsibility for meeting these needs by
reciprocating the financial care they had received in the past. They also expected
younger relatives to first help cover the household expenses, through financial
contributions or goods-in-kin, before addressing their personal expenses:

If he manages to get a job, he’s supposed to assist me in the household. He

can have some money for his personal use but he is supposed to know that you
are supposed to start in the household instead of using all the money for your
personal use (Sindiswa, 66)

These expectations were placed on both male and female kin. Importantly,
the women did not view the OAG as replacing a younger relative’s responsi-
bility for reciprocal financial care:

It is very important if a child is working to support the family. If you raise your
child, no matter you are getting an Old Age Grant, your child is supposed to
support you. Not to say: “No, you have got an Old Age Grant, use your grant.”
Your child does not have that right. (Mongoli, 84)

In using a rights discourse, Mongoli refuted the idea that social grants had
freed individuals from their intergenerational care obligations. As reflected by
Sta (65), reciprocating financial care drew younger relatives into a joint proj-
ect of looking after the collective: ‘Once a child starts working and getting a
salary, he is supposed to assist in the household so that they can work together
as a family.’ These beliefs, with their emphasis on shared responsibility and
collective wellbeing, resonate with the ethos of Ubuntu.
The younger participants seemed to share these beliefs about kin sup-
port and financial caregiving. They acknowledged the mutual relationship
of care between themselves and the older women in their households. They
also recognised their older relatives’ expectations of financial care; that, when
employed, they should provide financial support to their households and that
this support should be prioritised over personal spending:

When I was not working, I was depending on my mother. But now I am working
and getting a salary, I am supposed to support my mother. I can support my
family and manage to get the things that I need. But the thing I am supposed to
do first is to make sure that my mother is surviving. (Fundiswa, 32)
572 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

These findings show that, in principle, the OAG recipients and the younger
participants agreed on the reciprocal nature of and joint responsibility for
financial caregiving in their households. As discussed below, this didn’t easily
translate into practice, often resulting in negotiation and conflict.

Financial caregiving as involving intergenerational

negotiation and conflict
Despite the shared perceptions of financial caregiving discussed above, the
OAG recipients expressed that in practice, it was not always easy to secure
financial care from younger relatives when they were employed. In the SEYA
households, the women had conversations with their employed younger rela-
tives each month to tell them about their household’s expenses. Melta (76)
spoke about this in relation to her granddaughters:

As a parent, I sit down with them, especially over month end, and explain what
we need to do. If we need more groceries, I explain that we should get this and
this and that we should contribute money so that we can all get what we need.

These conversations could be interpreted as attempts to negotiate for finan-

cial care from their employed household members. In drawing attention to
the household needs, Melta may have tried to create awareness among her
younger kin that financial care was needed. She may have also conveyed ideas
about the joint responsibility for financial caregiving and tried to reinforce a
sense of obligation to share this responsibility. At the time of the fieldwork,
the women had managed to secure this financial care. However, some implied
that this support was not guaranteed: ‘Just say thanks if your daughters still
listen to you when they are bringing the money.’ (Melta, 76).
Similarly, the women in the NOSEYA households attempted to nego-
tiate for the provision of financial care when their younger kin earned an
income. However, many had not been able to secure this intergenerational
support. Mongoli (84) relayed such an experience:

I raised my son and then my son had a child. Once my son got a job, I asked
him to assist me to raise his child. He said: “No, I don’t have enough. You must
rather stop paying the funeral policy for him instead of asking money from me.

Rather than provide financial support, Mongoli’s son suggested that she
should cease the funeral insurance payments for his child. Her son may have
implied that his assistance was not necessary as she could manage on her own
by ‘prioritising’ her expenditure. However, for Mongoli and the other women,
funeral insurance was an important way of caring for their households. It
ensured the financial security of their families in relation to an unpredictable
Button and Ncapai 573

life event that usually exacerbated economic hardship. Therefore, to cease

these payments would be synonymous to not providing care.
Given the limited data relating to the OAG recipients’ younger house-
hold members, it is only possible to suggest tentative explanations for the
patterns of intergenerational negotiation and financial caregiving discussed
above. The OAG recipients in the SEYA households lived with relatives who
had been employed in their jobs for over a year. These women may have been
able to establish more consistent patterns of financial caregiving with their
employed kin. In contrast, the younger participants in the NOSEYA house-
holds were employed sporadically. Without knowing when or how they would
earn again, they may have more readily seized the opportunity for personal
spending (Spiropoulos, 2017) rather than fulfilling the OAG recipients’ care-
giving expectations. Gender dynamics may have also shaped these outcomes.
All the younger adults in the SEYA households were women. Although there
is an absence of comparative data on ‘stably employed’ young men, gendered
roles may have contributed to the younger women being more willing to
share their incomes with their households. All the younger participants in
the NOSEYA households, in contrast, were men. Here gendered social norms
may have operated against the OAG recipients, making it more difficult for
them to claim financial care from male relatives who may have felt justified in
using their earnings at their own discretion (Mosoetsa, 2011).
As Tronto (1993: 109) noted, care often involves conflict. In this study,
conflict was experienced alongside negotiations for financial care, albeit in
different ways across the households in the sample.
As discussed above, the OAG recipients approached their income-earn-
ing children and grandchildren with the aim of securing financial care from
them. However, the younger participants interpreted this as an attempt to
exert control over their earnings. They described their older female relatives
as judgemental about how they managed and spent their wages:

Sometimes our parents want to control our money. We must give it to them
so that they can spend it for us . . . They will ask you want you did with your
wages. They think we waste our money on things that are not important. (Kuhle,
27)

The younger participants may have perceived their older kin’s attempts to
‘control’ their earnings as a way of ensuring that their money was used ‘cor-
rectly’; that is, on household needs first. Although the younger participants
acknowledged the expectations of financial care placed on them, they also
expressed the desire to spend their earnings on their personal wants and needs.
In the SEYA households, the younger participants recognised the impor-
tance of their financial contributions but were also frustrated with these care
arrangements. Given their low wages and the persistent financial needs of
574 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

their households, they felt that this financial caregiving crowded out their
capacity to meet their own needs:

Sometimes I plan on buying something for myself. But when I arrive in the
household, I find out that something is needed in the household. I have to buy
that thing which is needed and then I don’t manage to buy what I was planning
for myself. It hurts me a lot. (Fundiswa, 32)

These feelings were exasperated by the perception that their older kin did not
understand or recognise that younger adults had their own expenses to cover:

It’s difficult but they must understand how we feel about the money, our
money. . . If I am working, I am working very hard to get what I want. So, I
wish that someone can understand that yes, I will give her money but I need to
do things for myself. (Kuhle, 27)

In the NOSEYA households, conflict arose not only because the women were
dissatisfied with the lack of financial care from their younger kin, but also
because they disapproved of how these earnings were spent. Sindiswa and her
son, Richard, conveyed their experiences of conflict on this matter:

When I am working, I maybe have R300 just to drink alcohol . . . And then
I drink it out and maybe tomorrow I don’t have a cent left . . . Sometimes,
normally, when I am drunk, I can’t lie about it, I get drunk and then she says:
'Why do you do this? You must stop.' And then we start fighting. (Richard, 28)
I have no choice because I cannot throw him away, out of this house because he
is my son. If he is not working, he is not working. If he is drinking too much, I
have no choice. I have to survive with what he is doing. (Sindiswa, 66)

Like many of the other women, Sindiswa was unable to change her son’s
behaviour or negotiate for financial care. Patriarchal social norms may
have contributed to this. For instance, Richard went on to mention: ‘As
a man, you have too much pride. Sometimes you find out that you are
wrong, but now it’s coming from a woman.’ Richard seemed unwilling
to accept his mother’s critique of the use of his earnings. Underlying this
may have been the belief that as a man, he was entitled to make his own
financial decisions and, even if mistaken, should not be accountable to his
mother for them.
The younger participants in the NOSEYA households also expressed the
view that their older kin did not understand the importance of discretion-
ary spending. Malusi (23) reflected that this was an important incentive in
searching for and continuing employment:
Button and Ncapai 575

If I am spending money on something that I love, that would motivate me to

go back and work . . . Getting money, girlfriends, going to the tavern, all those
things motivate people to go to work.

These findings show that, in practice, negotiation and conflict formed part of
the OAG recipients’ experiences of financial caregiving in their intergenera-
tional relationships. Furthermore, they may have felt disempowered in having
their authority and caregiving expectations contested when negotiating for
financial care from their younger kin. While the women struggled to secure
financial care from their younger relatives, their younger kin seemed able to
resist, or, at least contest, the claims made on their earnings. These experi-
ences may, therefore, point to unequal power relations within the households
in the study.

Financial caregiving as involving emotional and

financial vulnerability
The intra-household dynamics described above contributed to the emotional
and financial vulnerabilities experienced by the OAG recipients. The women
expressed that younger relatives who failed to reciprocate financial care as
expected, did not ‘care about’ their elders:

Once your child gets a job, your child just forgets that you suffered and struggled
to raise him or her . . . You raise your children but at the end of the day, your
children don’t care about you. (Nomanzi, 65)

These sentiments highlight the connection between financial and emotional

care. For the OAG recipients, the provision of financial care by a younger
relative was also an act of emotional care; of acknowledgement, concern and
affection.
The OAG recipients in the SEYA households received financial care
from their employed household members. However, the perceived precarity
of this caregiving worried them. Although their younger kin occasionally
had the financial means to assist them, the women in the NOSEYA house-
holds remained solely responsible for the financial care of their households.
The intra-household dynamics discussed above contributed to their burden
of care, placing them under immense financial strain. Five of the six OAG
recipients living in NOSEYA households regularly borrowed from informal
moneylenders (‘mashonisas’) to meet their households’ needs. These practices,
and the high interest rates attached to the loans (up to 50%), meant that the
women had become trapped in cycles of indebtedness, further increasing their
emotional and financial vulnerability:
576 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

You know, once you borrow money from mashonisas, you borrow each and every
time. Each time I receive my grant, I am supposed to pay the mashonisa and
borrow something again so that I can manage to cover all the needs we have in
the household. It’s traumatising. (Pamela, 70)

The women felt that they had little choice in borrowing from informal mon-
eylenders; given their stretched financial capacities and the absence of finan-
cial contributions from their younger kin. These experiences highlight how
intergenerational power relations and negotiations over financial caregiving
impacted the burden of care and vulnerabilities experienced by some of the
OAG recipients.

Discussion and conclusion

This article has discussed how fourteen female OAG recipients experienced
financial caregiving in their intergenerational relationships. As part of this,
the article highlighted how these women used the OAG to meet their co-
resident children and grandchildren’s needs for care. This encompassed the
phases and moral values of care developed by Tronto (1993). The women had
an awareness of, and cared about, the needs of their younger kin. Despite the
strain on their financial competencies, they also assumed responsibility for
these needs and undertook the work to directly meet these needs. Further-
more, as care-receivers, their younger relatives responded to and acknowl-
edged this care.
The article also sought to contribute towards a fuller understanding of
the OAG recipients’ experiences of financial caregiving, by exploring the
intra-household dynamics involved in this care provision. The OAG recipi-
ents believed that the provision of financial resources for the care of their
households was a collective responsibility that should be shared when younger
kin were employed. Although the younger participants shared these beliefs,
claiming financial caregiving from younger kin often involved intergenera-
tional negotiation and conflict. While the OAG recipients prioritised their
households’ needs over meeting their own, their younger kin felt strongly
about also using their earnings to address their own needs and wants. Bor-
rowing from Gouws and Van Zyl (2015), these findings could point to differ-
ences between Ubuntu-talk and Ubuntu-do. They could also be interpreted as a
weakening of the ethos of Ubuntu among younger generations. However, it is
argued here that younger kin do still value interdependence and mutual care
but they may be engaged in a process of ‘working out’ the meaning of their
care obligations for themselves, rather than simply adhering to the expecta-
tions of older relatives.
Button and Ncapai 577

Resonating with existing research, the OAG did not increase the women’s
social standing in their households (Mosoetsa, 2011). Despite their senior-
ity and economic status, they struggled to secure financial care from their
younger kin. This contributed to the burden of care and the vulnerabilities
they experienced. These experiences may also point to unequal power rela-
tions within the households. Gendered social norms, especially between the
OAG recipients and their male kin, may have contributed to these inequali-
ties. Additionally, research on intergenerational relationships in the post-
apartheid period has highlighted how older people have attributed the loss
of respect from younger relatives to the democratic culture of human rights
(Møller and Sotshongaye, 2002; Mathis, 2011). The state’s discourse of rights
may have contributed to younger household members being able to resist the
traditional authority and caregiving expectations of older kin, by enabling
them to claim rights to equality and independence.
A political ethic of care be used to examine the state’s role in the care
process and in the way care work is distributed in families. The state recog-
nised elderly people as in need of care and, through the social grant system,
has taken some responsibility for meeting these care needs. As care recipients
from the state, the women relied on the OAG as an important resource to
mitigate hardship. However, in assuming responsibility for the care of the
elderly, the state should be more attentive and responsive to how the OAG
is used; as a resource to also meet the needs of unemployed and dependent
younger kin. The article has highlighted the state’s role in shaping these care
needs and the ways in which they are met. State welfare provision, including
its familalist underpinnings, has combined with socio-economic conditions,
cultural beliefs around kin support and intra-household dynamics to establish
older women as important financial caregivers in their households.
Recognising older women not only as care-receivers but also as caregivers
raises the moral notion of competence (Tronto, 1993). How well older women
provide care, and more importantly, whether and how well they cope with
this caregiving, become important considerations. This and other research
has highlighted how widespread unemployment and an absence of state sup-
port for unemployed prime-aged adults has increased older women’s burdens
of care, placing them under great financial and emotional strain (Schatz and
Ogunmefun, 2007; Mosoetsa, 2011). It is argued here that the moral notions
of attentiveness, responsibility and responsiveness require that the state
should act to ease this burden of care. This could involve bringing the unem-
ployed into the social safety net, improving access to employment, providing
greater support to small and informal sector businesses and increasing support
for low-paid workers, especially addressing the precarity of their employment
experiences. This might better enable un- and underemployed workers to par-
ticipate in the collective project of caring for their families, while also helping
them meet their own needs for care.
578 C r i t i c a l S o c i a l P o l i c y 39(4)

Furthermore, the article has highlighted that financial resources, includ-

ing the OAG, are used in spaces of inequality and conflict. The question
of whether the state could intervene to achieve greater equity in intergen-
erational relationships is difficult to answer. A step in the right direction
would be to more explicitly recognise power relations in families, instead of
invisibilising them in social policy (Gouws and Van Zyl, 2014). Additionally,
while the state has made strides in trying to address gender inequality, per-
haps more attention could be paid to how gender and generational inequali-
ties intersect to reproduce the burdens of care experienced by different family
members.
The findings discussed here reflect further avenues for research. The study
highlighted intergenerational negotiations over financial caregiving but more
detailed research on this topic would improve our understandings of inequal-
ity and care in families. Similarly, additional research on the care experiences
of younger people and men is required. Lastly, while this article highlighted
some of the vulnerabilities that the women experienced in their intergenera-
tional relationships, future research could provide insight into how they also
exercise agency and resistance.

Acknowledgements
An earlier version of this article was published as ‘Intergenerational care,
negotiation and conflict: Female state pensioners’ experiences of financial
caregiving in low-income, multigenerational households’, CSSR Working
Paper 415 (Cape Town: Centre for Social Science Research, University of Cape
Town). The authors are grateful to the anonymous referees from Critical Social
Policy whose valuable comments and insights on subsequent versions of this
manuscript have greatly improved the ideas reflected here.

Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the
research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was made
possible by support from the NRF Freestanding, Innovation and Scarce Skills
Development Fund [grant number 94583] and by the Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation.

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Button and Ncapai 581

Author biographies
Kirsty Button is a PhD student in the Families and Societies Research Unit at the Centre for
Social Science Research at the University of Cape Town. Her PhD is on the negotiation of care
and the use of the Old Age Grant in intergenerational relationships in contemporary South
Africa. She has published research in the Journal of Southern African Studies and Current Sociology.

Thobani Ncapai is a Research Assistant at the Centre for Social Science Research at the Uni-
versity of Cape Town. During the 16 years that he has worked in this capacity, Thobani has
been involved in numerous research projects across South Africa, in the areas of HIV/AIDS
treatment and prevention, social cohesion, land occupation and housing, social mobility and
family and intergenerational relationships. Thobani has also been involved in HIV/AIDS activ-
ism in South Africa, working closely with the Treatment Action Campaign and Médecins Sans
Frontiéres.