For more than fifty years, pensions have been the subject of academic enquiry and controversy. Debates have raged over, amongst other things, the need for pensions, the means by which they might be delivered, their implications for the public finances, their impact on an individual’s employment motivations and their significance for national and global capital markets. These debates, and others, have spawned a vast and disparate literature.

Currently, the issue that most often exercises the minds of academics and policy makers is that of pension reform. It is widely recognized that decades of social and economic change have rendered obsolete the pension arrangements in many developed and developing countries. The question of what now constitutes an appropriate set of pension arrangements is, however, far from settled. Opinions are divided over whether existing national pension systems can be modified to make them fit contemporary needs and circumstances, or whether they should be jettisoned in favour of something entirely different.

Central to the analysis of many issues in pension provision is the universal phenomenon of population ageing. Around the world, falling birth rates and rising life expectancy are raising the ratio of elderly to working-age people. For several decades the literature on pensions and population ageing has been extremely negative. Recently, though, a series of books and papers have appeared which argue for a more benign, less pessimistic, interpretation of population ageing.

The papers and articles included in each volume of this new Routledge Major Work have been selected so as to reflect the multi-dimensional nature of the subject and the interest it has aroused internationally. With a full index and an introduction newly written by the editor, this four-volume collection is a unique and valuable research resource for both student and scholar alike.