Japan’s “New Homeless”

Since the mid-1990s, homelessness has become a major issue of public discussion in Japan, and is often viewed as a new social problem facing Japanese society. The issue of homelessness contrasts images of the absence of poverty and homelessness in postwar Japan, often explained based on the unique features of Japanese-style employment and welfare, containing poverty and unemployment. This paper contrasts these views with a perspective on the continuity ofpoverty, and homelessness in postwar Japan. Specifically, I discuss the characteristics of homelessness in Tokyo, how they relate to the structure of the economy and employment practices, and how the problems oftoday’shomeless are accommodated in the welfare system. I argue that the homeless cast light on patterns of loss of employment, housing, and means of subsistence, characteristic to Japan’s economy and welfare system, and contribute to a new understanding of the dynamics of poverty in contemporary Japan.     

Japan's “New Homeless”

Since the mid-1990s, homelessness has become a major issue of public discussion in Japan, and is often viewed as a new social problem facing Japanese society. The issue of homelessness contrasts images of the absence of poverty and homelessness in postwar Japan, often explained based on the unique features of Japanese-style employment and welfare, containing poverty and unemployment. This paper contrasts these views with a perspective on the continuity of poverty, and homelessness in postwar Japan. Specifically, I discuss the characteristics of homelessness in Tokyo, how they relate to the structure of the economy and employment practices, and how the problems of today's homeless are accommodated in the welfare system. I argue that the homeless cast light on patterns of loss of employment, housing, and means of subsistence, characteristic to Japan's economy and welfare system, and contribute to a new understanding of the dynamics of poverty in contemporary Japan.     

Losing Ground: Social Policy and Disabled People in Great Britain, 1980-90

This paper reviews some of the major themes of social policy in Britain over the past decade and examines in detail the impact on disabled people in three major areas: employment; income and social security provision; and the organisation and delivery of health and social welfare services. It will be argued that, despite some superficial similarities between the demands of disabled people and the rhetoric of the New Right for reductions in dependency and control by the state, the dominant policy themes of free market forces, privatisation and reductions in the scope of welfare state services have not served disabled people's interests well. Moreover, attempts to “protect” disabled people within a much reduced welfare state have not been effective and have in any case had the unwelcome consequence of increasing the scrutiny and control exercised by professionals and others. This stands in contrast to the alternative policy agenda articulated by disabled people themselves, which stresses autonomy, integration, an end to discrimination, and rights—to equal chances in employment, to an adequate level of income, and to services which enhance personal choice and facilitate independent living.     

A Global Perspective on Social Security Programmes for Disabled People

By the mid-1990s, 163 countries had statutory general disability programmes. Most have adopted social insurance as their primary policy instrument, which restricts coverage to those in paid formal employment, makes benefit eligibility dependent upon the satisfying of specific minimum contribution period requirements and provides earnings-related pensions. Many countries also provide supplementary and special need benefits. Programme funding comes overwhelmingly from employer and employee contributions, with a majority of countries providing government subsidies. Using a methodology that assesses national statutory social security intentions, a ranking of these disability programmes reveals that Australia has the best designed one.     

Feminism in the Grips of a Pincer Attack—Traditionalism, liberalism, and globalism

Abstract:  The dichotomy of individualism versus collectivism is one of the pivots around which political ideologies in postwar Japanese society can be broken down. Many people had thought that what postwar Japan needed was the development of modern individuals who represented a departure from feudalistic thinking. Against the backdrop of uncertainties related to employment and life in general engendered by a prolonged economic stagnation and globalism, Japanese society in the twenty-first century is being pounded by a tempest of neoliberalism and neoconservatism. In the midst of this storm, ideas advocating social policies that promote gender equality are being dismantled by both of these forces. This is because the power of traditionalism as a force for asserting a revisionist ideology in modern Japanese society primarily constitutes the power of neoconservatism, which embraces neoliberalism with a view to revitalizing the free economy through the elimination of social welfare and the intensification of free competition. In order to establish formidable economic competitiveness, neoliberalism and neoconservatism (neoliberalism = neoconservatism) reject domestic systems geared towards labor protection (deregulation) and extol familism and nationalism as means to bringing social unrest under control through the mobilization of the labor force (traditionalism). However, the habitual way of thinking that places traditionalism and liberalism in a dichotomous pivot remains ingrained within us even now. Because globalization reinforces social mobility, these two positions will continue to gain strength even as they conflict with each other. With feminism in the grips of a pincer attack, the movement will struggle to maintain its breath.     

创新福利模式 优化社会管理

创造适合国情的福利模式,是社会管理成功的基础和奥妙所在。一个好的福利模式要能保持四个基本均衡:经济发展与福利支出的均衡,福利支出中的基础部分与非基础部分的均衡,福利机制中的刚性与柔性的均衡,福利责任结构中的政府与市场、家庭、个人之间的均衡。中国一些富裕农村所搞的集体福利为实现这些均衡提供了实践经验,而这些经验与底线公平理论非常契合。底线公平福利模式具有四个特点和优势:教育为基,劳动为本,服务为重,健康为要。它充分发挥中国优秀文化和社会结构优势,把发展性要素内置于福利模式之中,可以实现社会福利的内外平衡,为社会安全奠定基础。     

Social Exclusion in the European Union

Abstract

This article reviews the development of social policy in the European Union since the mid-1980s. It describes the origins and evolution of the concept of social exclusion, the dominant paradigm for social welfare policy-making in the European Union and its member states. Case examples from Great Britain and Wales provide indications of the impacts for direct services.     

Social Citizenship Guarantee for Minorities in Japan: Present and Future

In recent years, the presence of minorities and their ways of life have become the subject of public interest in Japan. These minorities have experienced misrecognition and denial of their rights, and have been forced to live without benefiting from social redistribution. However, the lack of acceptance of minorities or their ways of life by majorities is being challenged. These aspects of recognition and redistribution are matters of universal human dignity. They are indispensable when considering issues of security in the lives of minorities. To achieve this security it is necessary to consider social citizenship. It described the way we are treated in society. In this article I examine the current state of social citizenship for minorities in Japan. An analysis of the contents and characteristics of social policy and social security systems in which social citizenship is embodied suggests that social citizenship in Japan is still strongly based on traditional social standards. This traditional orientation constitutes an obstacle to guaranteeing social citizenship for minorities. Moreover, the more serious inherent problem is that neither the concept of citizenship nor that of rights has been adequately accepted by the people. Given these points, it is unsurprising that the majority perceives minorities as deviant, and this situation has made guarantees of social citizenship for minorities much more difficult. A full guarantee of social citizenship for minorities requires further efforts to be made in human rights education and citizenship education.     

Social Origins and Transformations: The Changing Role of English Housing Associations

Following the suggestion of Ragin (1998, Voluntas, 9(3), 261–270), this article uses social origins theory (Salamon and Anheier, 1998, Voluntas, 9(3), 213–248) as an heuristic device to explore change in a specific field of nonprofit activity; the English housing association sector. Conventional histories of the sector in the twentieth century suggest a succession of eras with different policy drivers. These eras can be seen as consistent with shifts in welfare regime from liberal to social democratic (after 1919) and to neo-liberal/neo-corporatist (after 1980). Examples drawn from a panel study support the analysis of Esping-Anderson (1990, The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism, Princeton University Press, Princeton) that underlying the apparent stability of welfare regimes there are constant processes of negotiation and conflict which may lead to transformations at organization, sector, or regime level. Rather than simply responding to policy drivers, some housing associations have been able to influence the environment in which policy is made and thereby to shape their own and the sector's transformations.     

Reassessing Welfare Capitalism:

This paper develops the argument that a communitarian regime of capitalism might contribute to a society in which economic power is democratically controlled and where full participation is guaranteed, especially for those social groups lacking access to jobs and/or sufficient income. The paper analyzes community- based approaches to social policy in Switzerland and the United States, two western countries with a federalistic political system relying on local and functional communities. It explains the role played by municipalities and trade unions in improving the performance of welfare capitalism when dealing with unemployment and poverty. The examples of community-based approaches to social policy lead to the conclusion that both in addition and complementary to government intervention, modern capitalist societies have to rely on strong local communities and functional associations in order to establish a just social order and to ensure full employment and income security for all.     

Social Policy as Social Risk Management

With the growing sophistication in social policy instruments and the advances made in the analysis of their impact, it became clear that the analytical separation of social policy and social security policy from other policy areas is increasingly difficult. The paper discusses a new analytical approach based on the social management of risks. It redefines social policy as public interventions to assist individuals and households to cope with their risks. The conceptual framework starts with the notion of main needs and defines and subdivides the risks threatening the satisfaction of these main needs. An important feature of the framework is that social policy is not only linked to the satisfaction of the main needs at a certain moment, but to the risk that, at a certain moment in the life-course of an individual, the needs cannot not be satisfied. Social policy is then no longer solely focussed on the guaranteeing that all individuals in an economy can fulfil their main needs in a static framework. Quite the contrary, social policy is focused on preventing contingencies to materialize, on mitigating the effects before they materialize and on coping with the unfortunate moment bad luck, shocks or unfortunate events strike. The social risk management framework rests on the observation that the satisfaction of main needs and the management of risks, is not the sole responsibility of public authorities. Social welfare is produced by at least three institutions symbolically summarized as the social welfare triangle of which markets, families and public authorities form the corner points.     

Ethnic Organizations and the Welfare State: The Impact of Social Welfare Programs on the Formation of Indochinese Refugee Associations

The expansion of the welfare state during the 20th century has altered the conditions shaping the formation of ethnic organizations. Drawing upon research in the divergent fields of social policy, immigrant communities, and social movements, this article argues that social welfare programs promote or suppress ethnic organizations depending on how they affect an ethnic community's institutional completeness. This welfare state channeling theory is contrasted with ethnic competition and resource mobilization explanations for the formation of ethnic organizations. An analysis of 800 Indochinese refugee associations finds that public assistance has no effect on the prevalence of these organizations, but that privatization of federal social service expenditures does, thus partially supporting the welfare state channeling theory.     

Window on the world. Social policy and social work in New Zealand

In recent years, New Zealand has attracted some international attention for its relatively rigorous application of monetarist, neo-liberal social and economic policies. This has led to its transformation from being one of the most socialized and protected economies in the western alliance to being relatively deregulated and open to global trade. The implications for New Zealand society and its publicly funded services have been profound. This article gives a summary of the outcomes of the neo-liberal era for New Zealand, including some of the major changes specific to social policy and social work. Areas of interest include: the growing recognition of the bi-cultural foundation of New Zealand society; the changes in welfare, labour, housing, and social security policies; and especially New Zealand's unique approach to the welfare of children and young persons. The implications of New Zealand's strong emphasis on contracting-out of social services are considered, alongside a broader assessment of the benefits of the 'reforms' for New Zealanders collectively. Some indications of future changes in direction, subsequent to the recent change in government, are also given.     

Social Change and Social Policy in China: National Adaptation to Global Challenge

As a part of designed human intervention against social problems, social policy has to respond and adapt to social changes. In this article, the author aims to discuss social changes that occurred in the past decade in China (including economic, demographic, and cultural changes) and relate them to relevant social policies formulated by the Chinese government to address the concerned social issues. To interpret the roles of the state, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and the community in tackling social problems in the changing context of the market economy and globalization, the author attempts to provide a theoretical explanation on the emergence of social policy in China in a new era and to further re-assess the concept of the welfare regime in East Asian countries.     

Social security reform: Does partial privatization make sense for China?

By the year 2025, one quarter of the world's population over age 60 will be living in China, a nation in the process of partially privatizing its social security system. This article presents a brief history of social security policy in China, describes the current scheme, presents an analysis of the pros and cons of this scheme, and asks why China is currently on the road to adopting policy changes that are so strongly influenced by the neoliberal social security model being advanced by the World Bank. Social security policy in China is being driven largely by demographic considerations, but it is also being influenced by factors linked to globalization. The plan to partially privatize the nation's social security system will put at risk many vulnerable categories of the population, particularly women, low-wage workers, those in the informal sector, and recent immigrants from rural areas.     

Lutheranism from Above and from Below: “Pastoral Professionals” and Trust within the Nordic State/Society Nexus

The article points to the dispersion, democratization, and feminization of “pastoral” forms of power and authority since the mid-19th century as a key to understanding the exceptionally high degree of social trust in the Nordic countries. Taking Norway as its central case, it argues that the Nordic welfare state has been shaped by an older, distinctively Lutheran–Pietist combination of educational forms of government from above and edifying popular self-organization from below. This trust-producing synthesis has been sustained by such “pastoral” professions as teaching, nursing, and social work, functioning as mediators between public welfare policies and the life world of citizens.     

Educating Social Workers for an Aging Society

Longevity is one of the great achievements of the 20th century and its implications for the new century will be profound. The unprecedented demographic shift to an increasingly older society will have a dramatic impact on individual choices over the life course, the structure of the family, and multiple social institutions. Social work can make unique professional contributions to older persons and the late-life family. This article asserts, however, that social work is not adequately prepared to practice in the aging society. The authors document the challenges to social work and recommend addressing these challenges through educational innovations.     

Social policy planning in a federal structure: A social learning strategy

Current social welfare policy planning reflects an inadequate sense of the problems to be solved and an incentive structure which discourages responsible decision making. Proceeding from overly simple cause and effect models, social welfare policies are designed with detailed administrative regulations to insure uniformity and regularity of behavior across the states. When problems are not solved, policy makers focus on the failures of personnel to follow all the detailed regulations. This leads to additional efforts to enforce compliance. There is evidence that implementation personnel consistently and purposively do stretch or ignore regulations in order to service clients. An alternative to further detailed regulations then is to use the autonomy of state units in the federal structure by eliminating negative incentives to innovation and creating incentives to experiment with alternative programs. As a social learning strategy this would encourage innovation and make it possible to learn from the experience of personnel who daily confront the realities of welfare problems and the large array of administrative details.     

包容性增长的印度模式及其对中国的启示

包容性增长作为一种新的经济社会发展理论,旨在坚持发展经济,坚持社会公平正义,坚持以人为本,让经济全球化和经济发展成果通过扶贫政策、扩大生产性就业领域、提高人力资源能力和社会保障能力等途径,惠及所有国家和地区、惠及所有人群。本文分析了包容性增长理论诞生的背景,归纳了其概念的内涵,总结了印度实施包容性增长的主要做法,并以此为借鉴,提出了中国实施包容性增长的基本路径。这对当今我国正在编制的国民经济十二五规划,促进经济社会包容性、可持续、平衡的发展具有重要现实意义。