“A New Job after Retirement”: Negotiating Grandparenting and Intergenerational Relationships in Urban China

Abstract

Based on interviews with 120 adult only children and their parents in urban Tianjin, this article shows how grandparenting becomes a crucial site for the intergenerational negotiation around childcare, family obligations, and the unfulfilled aspirations for individualisation. While only child couples rely heavily on their parents for childcare, a lot of tensions are involved in this process. Although grandparents do not always willingly embrace the heavy burden of intergenerational childcare, their concern about elderly care sometimes compels them to nevertheless take up the work. Through providing a nuanced picture of grandparenting in urban China, this article seeks to reveal the changing ideas of family obligation and responsibility, as well as the social transformation in China that underpins such change. It argues that the individualisation process is far from finished, as reality is pulling people back to solve problems within the family.