Homeless People in Japan - WordPress.com · ‘homeless people’ refers exclusively to ‘rough sleepers.’ So in Japan, homeless people do not include people who are living in

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Homeless People in Japan:Characteristics, Processes and Policy Responses1)

Yusuke KAKITA

Introduction

1. Discussion

The first ‘National Survey of Homeless People’ was held in Japan in January and February 2003 and the results were published in the following month of March2). According to this survey, in which I participated, it is estimated that there are currently more than 25,000 homeless people in Japan.

This paper, by analyzing the national survey results, aims at disclosing the characteristics of homeless people in Japan. In addition, I would like to relate the process of falling into homelessness and the occupation and housing conditions of homeless people before they became homeless. I will insist on the importance of social security and social welfare systems as a safety net to protect people to fall into homelessness. Finally, I would like to discuss the policy responses extended to homeless people.

2. On the Term ‘Homeless People’

In Japan, ‘homeless people’ (hōmuresu) and ‘rough sleepers’ (nojuku seikatsusha) are words that are used in a similar way. However, I would like first to raise readers’ attention on the point that there is a clear distinction between ‘homeless people’ or the state of homelessness and ‘rough sleepers’ or the state of sleeping rough.

For example in the European context, ‘rough sleepers’ are people who do not have a ‘house’ to live in, and they sleep outdoors. ‘Homeless people’ are more generally those with unstable or insufficient housing conditions. Consequently, rough sleepers are included in the more general homeless definition. They represent a particular type of homeless people. Such taxonomic differences between Japan and Europe have a significant impact on policy making. In the European case, because of an extended definition of ‘homeless people,’ policy generally includes preventive measures and the provision of stable dwelling places to people at risk of becoming rough sleepers.

On the contrary in Japan, as the official definition of ‘homeless people’ was made in the ‘Law on Special Measures for Self-Sufficiency Support for Homeless People,’ the term ‘homeless people’ refers exclusively to ‘rough sleepers.’ So in Japan, homeless people do not include people who are living in unstable housing such as laborer’s lodgings (hanba)

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or cheap lodging houses (doya), or people who are dependent on friends or relatives to get a place to sleep. These people are not yet a major concern of Japanese policy on homeless people, and measures that could prevent them to fall into sleeping rough are lacking.

I believe that ‘homeless people’ and ‘rough sleepers’ should be clearly differentiated, but in this paper, I use, with necessary warnings, the Japanese official definition of ‘homeless people,’ which strictly refers to ‘rough sleepers.’

3. Materials Used to Discuss the Topic

Before starting the analysis, allow me to present an outline of the national survey on homeless people in Japan conducted in 2003.

The survey was planned under the auspices of the ‘Law on Special Measures for Self-Sufficiency Support for Homeless People,’ enforced in August 2002. Based on the results of the survey and public hearings on it, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare compiled its ‘Basic Policy on Self-Sufficiency Support for Homeless People’3) at the end of July, and now each local authority is designing its own action plan to put the Policy into practice.

The national survey was composed of two pillars: a quantitative rough estimation of the number of homeless people in Japan, and a qualitative investigation concerning homeless people’s daily life and current status. The former was conducted simultaneously by all the municipalities throughout Japan. The latter was conducted in municipalities having a particularly high proportion of homeless people and the total number of investigated subjects reached 2,163. The subjects were interviewed face to face and were asked various questions including questions about their daily life, how they started their homeless life, their needs and requests, etc. A uniformed questionnaire format was used.

Due to the fact that the national survey result just shows a simple tabulation of figures, I use to reinforce my analysis and assure its integrity another similar survey conducted in 2001 by Osaka Prefectural Government (hereinafter Osaka Prefecture Survey of 2001)4).

1. General Characteristics of Homeless People in Japan

1.1. Geographical Distribution of Homeless People

Table 1 shows the estimated number of homeless people by prefecture based on the rough estimation survey, which says there are 25,296 homeless people throughout Japan. The noteworthy thing is that most of them are concentrated in prefectures where large cities are located. Especially, more than a half of them live in Tokyo and Osaka, the former accounting for 6,361 and the latter 7,757. Aichi Prefecture, of which the prefectural capital is Nagoya City, the third largest city in Japan, has 2,121 homeless people. Thus the number of homeless people in Osaka, Tokyo and Aichi totals 16,239, accounting for two-thirds of all the homeless people in Japan.

As Table 1 clearly shows, though most homeless people are living in large cities, they are found throughout all the 47 prefectures in Japan.

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Homeless People in Japan

1.2. Gender and Age of Homeless People

Out of 2,163 homeless people surveyed in the qualitative survey, 2,014 or 95.2% of them were male and 101 or 4.8% were female (See figure 1). Almost all the homeless people are, thus, male. As figure 2 clearly shows, most of the subjects are in their 50s and 60s. Average age is 55.9. The data clearly demonstrate that most homeless people in Japan are male and middle-aged or older5).

1.3. Living Status of Homeless People

Most homeless people build a small tent or a simple cabin using waste wood and blue plastic sheeting to cover their ‘house’ and live in it (Picture 1). Most of such tents and cabins are found in parks, riverbanks and on the road. The national survey, conducted in winter, found that some homeless people did not have cabins or tents to live in, and had no means of protection from the weather except blankets and cardboard boxes. A few wore only a jumper,

Table 1: Total and Rough Sleepers Populations by Prefecture

No. of No. ofPrefecture Population Homeless People Prefecture Population Homeless People (As of Oct.2000) (Jan.to Feb. 2003) (As of Oct.2000) (Jan.to Feb. 2003)

Hokkaido 5,683,062 142 Shiga 1,342,832 57Aomori 1,475,728 16 Kyoto 2,644,391 660Iwate 1,416,180 18 Osaka 8,805,081 7,757Miyagi 2,365,320 222 Hyogo 5,550,574 947Akita 1,189,279 13 Nara 1,442,795 14Yamagata 1,244,147 24 Wakayama 1,069,912 90Fukushima 2,126,935 43 Tottori 613,289 13Ibaragi 2,985,676 130 Shimane 761,503 4Tochigi 2,004,817 134 Okayama 1,950,828 65Gunma 2,024,852 87 Hiroshima 2,878,915 231Saitama 6,938,006 829 Yamaguchi 1,527,964 33Chiba 5,926,285 668 Tokushima 824,108 14Tokyo 12,064,101 6,361 Kagawa 1,022,890 46Kanagawa 8,489,974 1,928 Ehime 1,493,092 85Niigata 2,475,733 74 Kochi 813,949 23Toyama 1,120,851 24 Fukuoka 5,015,699 1,187Ishikawa 1,180,977 22 Saga 876,654 41Fukui 828,944 24 Nagasaki 1,516,523 41Yamanashi 888,172 51 Kumamoto 1,859,344 124Nagano 2,215,168 37 Oita 1,221,140 39Gifu 2,107,700 86 Miyazaki 1,170,007 22Shizuoka 3,767,393 465 Kagoshima 1,786,194 80Aichi 7,043,300 2,121 Okinawa 1,318,220 158Mie 1,857,339 46 Total 126,925,843 25,296

Source: Statistics Bureau, Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications (2002); Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (2003).


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Figure 1: Homeless People by Gender Figure 2: Age Distribution of Homeless People

Picture 1: Homeless People’s Tents in a Park

% %

lacking even blankets and cardboard boxes to protect them from the cold weather.As for the place of sleeping, 1,891 respondents or 84.1% answered they had a fixed place

to sleep. This high rate is understandable because the survey was targeting homeless people sleeping in a fixed place. However, taking into account other surveys on homeless people, this is a typical trend of homeless people in Japan.

Figure 3 shows the length of homeless periods. People with less than three years’ experience of homelessness comprised 56.3% of the total respondents, while those with less than one year comprised 30.7%.

In terms of jobs and income base of homeless people, 1,400 respondents (64.7%) have some means to earn income. The fact that nearly two-thirds of respondents had a source of income is quite a noteworthy characteristic when speaking of homeless people in Japan. In other words, many homeless people do not make their living by begging, but by working. Speaking of job types, 1,011 respondents, or 73.3% of those with a source of income, earned money by collecting and selling waste products such as cans (Picture 2), followed by 234 respondents or 17.0% working as day laborers on construction sites.

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Figure 3: Homeless PeriodsHowever, the amount of income paid

to homeless people is not sufficient to secure a decent level of life. It is said that waste can collection brings in as little as 1,000 yen a day. Figure 4 shows monthly earnings from these jobs. Those who earn 10,000 to 30,000 yen a month comprise one third of respondents. When the number of people who earn less than 10,000 yen is included, 60% of respondents have income of not more than 30,000 yen a month. In a nutshell, it can be said that most homeless people in Japan are laboring-poor, whose jobs do not give them sufficient income to support their lives.

It is easily imagined that they hardly have enough meals daily with such an insufficient income. 995 respondents answered they take meals twice a day, which accounts for 46.2% of the total respondents, followed by 622 respondents or 28.9% who eat three times a day. That still leaves 364 respondents who answered they take only one meal a day (16.9%). These results clearly show that homeless people have difficulty in taking meals regularly. The details of meal taken were not included in the questionnaire this time, but, according to the Osaka Prefecture Survey of 2001, most of them cook a simple meal for themselves using a portable gas stove purchased or picked up from thrown-out household waste, followed by those who eat unsold packed foods past their sell-by date by picking them up from convenience stores and supermarkets’ dumpsters. Looking at their health condition, 1,047 respondents (48.4%) answered that they currently felt ill. Out of them, 324 respondents (31.6%) had had a chance to consult doctors or take

Picture2: A Homeless Person Collecting Cans

%

Less than5,000 yen

5,000 - 10,000 yen

10,000 -30,000 yen

30,000 -50,000 yen

50,000 -100,000 yen

100,000 yenMore than

Others

Figure 4: Monthly Earning by Homeless People

Less than3 months

3 - 6 6 months- 1 year

1 - 3 3 - 5 5 - 10or abovemonths years years years10 years

%


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medicines. However, 701 respondents (68.4%) had not taken any type of medical care.

2. The Process of Falling into Homelessness

This section analyzes how and why people fall into homelessness in Japan. In this analysis, occupation, and housing conditions of homeless people before they became so, and the reasons that made them homeless will be discussed. In addition, I would like to discuss the policy responses extended to people who are in danger of falling into homelessness, especially in relation to the function of public assistance (seikatsu hogo) as the ‘last resort’ of a safety net to protect them.

2.1. Work Environment before Becoming Homeless

Firstly, examined here are the types of job they worked in for the longest period of time and the one they engaged in immediately before becoming homeless, together with their status in employment.

In terms of job types, the job they worked for the longest period of time was construction-related business, accounting for 914 respondents (42.6%), followed by manufacturing with 368 respondents (17.2%) and the service sector with 252 respondents (11.7%). As for the jobs they took immediately before becoming homeless, 1,159 respondents answered that they worked in construction, accounting for 55.1% of total respondents, followed by 221 respondents who had been engaged in manufacturing (10.5%) and 187 in services (8.9%). Construction, manufacturing and services are typical occupations taken by people immediately before they become homeless. More than 50% of the respondents were, inter alia, engaged in construction-related business immediately before they became homeless.

In terms of status in employment, a majority (1,208 respondents or 56.7%) had been employed as ‘regular employees’ in most of their occupational experiences, followed by ‘daily employees’ accounting for 497 respondents (23.3%) and ‘temporary employees and part-timers’ representing 166 respondents (7.8%). When asked what was their status in employment immediately before becoming homeless, 834 respondents or 39.8% answered that they had been ‘regular employees’ followed by 757 respondents (36.1%) who answered ‘daily employees’ and 291 respondents (13.9%) who had been working as ‘temporary employees and part-timers.’ This demonstrates that more than half of the homeless people were former ‘daily employees,’ or ‘temporary employees and part-timers,’ which means that in the process of falling into homelessness, their status in employment had deteriorated and become unstable. The number of homeless people who answered they had been ‘regular employees’ in the questionnaire needs careful interpretation. In most cases, people who worked almost every day tended to respond that they had been ‘regular employees’ even if their status in employment would generally be categorized as ‘daily employees’ and ‘temporary employees and part-timers.’

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As discussed above, many homeless people were once employed to construction-related businesses, and in terms of their status in employment, most people in that industry worked as daily employees. From table 2, it can be observed that one-third of currently homeless people had once found jobs through yoseba (street day labor markets).

The proportion of homeless people without yoseba experience was higher than had been expected before the survey was conducted. I believe that this result is worthy of note and that this topic should be discussed with an eye on the welfare system in Japan as well as the condition of the yoseba labor market in recent years. It might be said that as unemployment6) and irregular employment status in Japan have increased, social security and social welfare systems are not working properly as a safety net.

Number Ratio 1 (%) Ratio 2 (%)San’ya (Tokyo) 245 22.4 31.3Kotobuki-cho (Yokohama) 158 14.4 20.2Kamagasaki (Osaka) 386 35.3 49.4Sasashima (Nagoya) 153 14.0 19.6Other yoseba 152 13.9 19.4Effective responses 1,094 100.0 139.9Effective respondent 782 36.2 Never worked through yoseba 1,376 63.6 No reply 5 0.2 Total 2,163 100.0 Ratio 1 represents the percentage against the number of ‘Effective responses.’Ratio 2 represents the percentage against the number of ‘Effective respondent.’Source: Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (2003).

2.2. Social Insurance Enrollment and Housing Conditions before

Becoming Homeless

A point that naturally arises is whether or not homeless people were enrolled in the Japanese social insurance system before becoming homeless. It is known that the Japanese social insurance system is generally established by employing companies. The type of social insurance differs according to status of employment and size of company. Note irregular workers, such as daily employees, temporary employees and part-timers, are often not covered under the Japanese social insurance system. A role of the social insurances, especially health insurance and unemployment insurance, is to protect people from economic hazards. Hence it is clearly worth asking if homeless people were once enrolled in the social insurance system or not. As the nationwide survey did not address this subject, I would like to draw readers’ attention to the Osaka Prefecture Survey of 2001.

Table 3 shows the result of the 2001 Osaka Prefecture Survey regarding the social insurance enrollment status of currently homeless people in terms of their former status in employment7). The number of homeless people who were not enrolled in the Japanese social insurance system when they were employed comes to 195 respondents or more than 50% of the total sample. In terms of employment status, those who were not enrolled in any social

Table 2: Have You Ever Worked as a Construction Workers through Yoseba?


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insurance systems account for 110 ‘daily employees’ (70.5% of that group) who did not pay social insurance premiums, followed by 36 ‘regular employees without social insurance’ (69.2% of that group) and 33 ‘temporary employees and part-timers’ (76.7% of that group). These figures mean that there is a higher rate of non-payers of Japanese social insurance premiums in the people who once had unstable jobs. This means that many homeless people had already dropped out of the Japanese social insurance system well before they became homeless.

Table 3: Social Insurance Enrollment Status by Status in Employment(immediately before becoming homeless)

Social Insurance Enrollment Status

Company’s and National Health organization’s insurance Pension Plan insurance and Not system (health insurance, and National Unemployment enrolled I don’t

Total employees’ pension plan, Health insurance for to any know and those sponsored by Insurance daily laborers of them mutual benefit System associations)

Regular employee 65 0 0 0 0 65

(with social insurances) % 100.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0

Regular employee 0 14 0 36 2 52

(without social insurance) % 0.0 26.9 0.0 69.2 3.8 100.0

Temporary employee 3 7 0 33 0 43

and part-timer % 7.0 16.3 0.0 76.7 0.0 100.0

Daily employee 2 15 23 110 6 156

% 1.3 9.6 14.7 70.5 3.8 100.0

Self-employed worker 6 7 0 3 0 16

% 37.5 43.8 0.0 18.8 0.0 100.0

Nominal self-employed 0 3 0 5 0 8

worker % 0.0 37.5 0.0 62.5 0.0 100.0

Others 1 1 0 8 0 10

% 10.0 10.0 0.0 80.0 0.0 100.0

Total 77 47 23 195 8 350

% 22.0 13.4 6.6 55.7 2.3 100.0

Note: Six former self-employed workers who were enrolled to company’s/organization’s insurance system include those who were enrolled to the national fishermen’s pension system.

Note 2: A nominal self-employed worker is officially categorized as a self-employed worker, but has the characteristics of an employee. For example, hitori oyakata who owns a small scale construction and transportation as a self-employed worker,but has no regular employees, a stall keeper are included in this nominal self-employed worker category.

Source: Study Group of Urban Welfare, College of Social Welfare, Osaka Prefecture University (2002).

Status in employm

ent (imm

ediately before becoming rough sleeper)

Another factor I would like to discuss in relation to the process of falling into homelessness is housing conditions immediately before becoming homeless. Most respondents (805 or 37.5%) lived in ‘privately-owned rented accommodation,’ followed by 299 (13.9%) who lived in ‘laborer’s lodgings’, and 297 people (13.8%) who lived in ‘dormitories and company-run houses’ – arrangements where the user has to vacate the room on leaving the company. Hence it can be said that a number of homeless people were in an unstable housing condition before becoming homeless.

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Nearly 70%, or 1,446 of respondents, were living in the same prefecture they had been living in before they became homeless. This means that homeless people are typically local people. They once had a job and were living close to the workplace before becoming homeless. Most of them did not migrate from one place to another. In order to address countermeasures for homeless people, it will thus be necessary to design measures for homeless people at local authorities’ level in addition to national level measures.

2.3. Trigger Factors to Sending People into Homelessness and

the ‘Last Resort’

The nationwide survey on homeless people this time included questions to each subject to find out why they became homeless. The results are tabulated in Table 4. The most noteworthy reasons are the following three: ‘Business became slow’ (768 respondents or 35.6%), ‘The company went bankrupt and I could not find a new employer’ (708 respondents or 32.9%) and ‘Illness, injury and advanced age made it difficult for me to work’ (406 respondents or 18.8%). Evidently, job loss is the most serious factor leading a person into homelessness.

Table 4: What Made You to Become Homeless? (Select all the answers applicable to you.)

Number Ratio 1 (%) Ratio 2 (%)

The company went bankrupt and I could not find a new employer. 708 19.2 32.9Business became slow. 768 20.8 35.6Illness, injury and advanced age made me difficult to work. 406 11.0 18.8Incomes decreased. 354 9.6 16.4I could not repay loans. 49 1.3 2.3I could not pay my rent. 327 8.9 15.2I could not afford to pay accommodation fees for laborers. 177 4.8 8.2I was pushed out of my apartment house due to rebuilding. 22 0.6 1.0I left my house to hide myself from the debt collectors. 92 2.5 4.3I was forced to vacate the house as my house was seized. 12 0.3 0.6I was out of hospital/shelters, etc., but had nowhere to go. 41 1.1 1.9Family problems 160 4.3 7.4Drink and gamble 126 3.4 5.8Others 416 11.3 19.3No reasons 32 0.9 1.5

Effective responses 3,690 100.0 171.2

Effective respondent 2,155 99.6 No response 8 0.4

Total 2,163 100.0

Ratio 1 represents the percentage against the number of ‘Effective responses.’Ratio 2 represents the percentage against the number of ‘Effective respondent.’Source: Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (2003).


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However, it is unthinkable that a person who loses their job will become homeless the very next day. There must be a certain time lag between job loss and becoming homeless. Indeed, a certain number of respondents answered that after they lost their job, they carried on living in the same place by paying the rent out of their savings until the savings ran out. Another example is that after losing jobs they temporarily lived in business hotels and 24-hour saunas when they could no longer afford to pay the rent. They became homeless when they could no longer pay hotel charges. During this ‘time lag,’ they tried hard to avoid homelessness, ultimately to no avail. It is during this ‘time lag’ that administrative support to at-risk people would have a significant meaning, possibly preventing people from slipping into homelessness. Did these people turn to the administration for help? If so, what measures were taken for them?

Unfortunately, this is another topic overlooked by the national survey on homeless people, but again the Osaka Prefecture Survey of 2001 gives us a hint. This survey found that, 34 people out of 74 surveyed (45.9%) actually consulted administrative bodies such as municipal welfare offices, when their difficulties in daily life reached the threshold level for plunging into homelessness. 23 out of 34 people (67.6%) responded that ‘their inquiries were rejected.’ 6 people said ‘the officer refused to give me any public assistance as I do not have a stable address to live, etc.’

For people one step from homelessness, the role of public assistance as the ‘last resort’ is very significant. The fact that the Japanese social security system and municipal welfare offices have not functioned well as a safety net to protect such people from homelessness should never be overlooked. Refusal by welfare officers to give them assistance is totally unacceptable. Moreover, it is illegal under the current Public Assistance Law to refuse public assistance just because applicants have no stable address.

This malfunctioning of the public assistance system must be viewed as one of the serious factors sending people into homelessness.

3. Policy Responses to Homeless People

This section discusses the desires of homeless people, and policy responses to homeless people. On the latter, I discuss the ‘Countermeasures for Homeless People’ designed by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare and the ‘Law on Special Measures for Self-Sufficiency Support for Homeless People’ enforced in August 2002.

3.1. Future Prospects of Homeless People

What desires homeless people have? Table 5 shows that 1,021 respondents or 49.7% of the total sample desired ‘to be employed and have a regular job.’ On the other hand, 176 respondents (8.6%) wanted to ‘take light jobs with administrative life supports’ due to health and age concerns. The three top items in table 5 are all related to the desire for a job. The number of respondents who fell under these top three categories comes to 64.9% of

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the entire sample, meaning that two-thirds of them desire to earn their living by any means including waste can collection; while 155 respondents (7.5%) answered that they just wanted to rely on social welfare systems such as public assistance.

It is necessary to be careful in interpreting these results, as to how to understand the response ‘I want to continue my homeless life,’ chosen by 270 respondents or 13.1% of the total sample. The nationwide survey did not make any detailed analysis of these people. I believe that it is necessary to make an in-depth analysis as to why and in what circumstances they made such an answer. Otherwise we risk being led to the false conclusion that they ‘were enjoying homeless life’ or that they were just ‘lazy.’ This point should be analyzed in detail, carefully and individually, as this would impose a certain impact on the process of designing public policy to extend support to homeless people8). I interviewed homeless people individually in the nationwide survey, and learned that most of them ‘wanted to be employed but hadn’t had a chance to get a job,’ ‘did not want to rely on public assistance as doing so is a dishonorable,’ and ‘did not want to use public and administrative accommodation.’ Homeless people are concerned about the quality as well as the quantity of public policies extended to them, and also about the images associated with those policies. This accounts for the variations in their answers to the questionnaire.

3.2. Issues about ‘Countermeasures for Homeless People’

In the national survey, questions in relation to the ‘Countermeasures for Homeless People’ designed by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare were asked to homeless people. More precisely, they were asked if they would like to use temporary shelters, an accommodation for homeless people prepared by the administration in large cities several years ago, and homeless self-sufficiency support centers.

The temporary shelters are currently in operation at four places in Osaka City and one in Nagoya City (as of April 1, 2004). Though each shelter has its own facilities and mode of operation, a shelter, generally provides simple accommodation with showers and toilets.

Table 5: Which Life Do You Want in the Future?

Persons % Effective %

I want to be employed as a regular employee. 1,021 47.2 49.7I want to take waste can collection, etc. 138 6.4 6.7I want to take light jobs with administrative life supports. 176 8.1 8.6I cannot work so I want to rely on social welfare system. 155 7.2 7.5I want to be hospitalized. 15 0.7 0.7I want to continue my homeless life. 270 12.5 13.1I don’t know 97 4.5 4.7Others 184 8.5 8.9

Effective responses 2,056 95.1 100.0No response 107 4.9 Total 2,163 100.0

Source: Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (2003).


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A shelter does not have separate rooms for each user; instead they sleep in bunk beds in large shared rooms. A homeless self-sufficiency support center offers accommodation and meals to homeless people enrolled in the facility. The facility helps homeless people achieve self-reliance by offering them employment counseling and job placement services. Currently, there are 13 facilities of this kind in large cities such as Osaka and Tokyo (as of April 1, 2004). The maximum period of stay in the facility is limited to 3 months in principle, but is extendable up to 6 months. No repeaters are allowed to use the facility. As with temporary shelters, rooms are shared by more than one user.

Do homeless people want to use temporary shelters and homeless self-sufficiency support centers? The result of the survey shows that approx. 60% of them responded they did not want to use them. Asked why, 20 to 30% of the negative respondents said they wanted to keep their privacy. In the case of homeless self-sufficiency support centers, 20% of respondents expressed reluctance to use the facilities saying ‘there are no prospects of getting jobs there.’ These answers need to be analyzed in detail. According to the interviews of homeless people made by me, many respondents who do not want to use these facilities complained about the quality of the living environment and the services on offer, saying that the facilities do not respect users’ privacy as no separate rooms are offered. As for the homeless self-sufficiency support centers, their complaints were mostly directed to the fact that the period allowed for them to use the facility is rather too short

‘The Basic Policy on Self-Sufficiency Support for Homeless People’ announced by the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare does not show any measures to improve the quality of the living environment and the services offered at these facilities. One of the serious problems with the ‘Countermeasures for Homeless People’ may lie in the fact that the services offered to homeless people at these facilities are far below the minimum standard of living guaranteed by the public assistance system. The result of this survey in 2003 clearly claims the need to reverse the current quality of the living environment and the services offered there.

Conclusion

This paper has outlined the characteristics of homeless people in Japan, using several statistical sources.

As previously noted, the national survey on homeless people referred to in this paper omitted many salient points; truly in-depth analysis of Japanese homeless people remains an unmet challenge. Nonetheless, the data produced by the national survey does contain valuable materials that should be referred to in academic studies and practical policies alike. As mentioned above, the national survey needs to be subjected to in-depth study and examination.

The latter half of this paper focused on two noteworthy topics: the process of falling into homelessness, and policy responses. I raised two major issues. One is the problem of unemployment and unstable employment status before becoming homeless, and the other concerns the limitations of policy responses and welfare systems dealing with homeless people

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and those at risk of falling into homelessness.I am determined to further examine these topics related to homeless people to produce a

finer picture of them, together with an international perspective9).

Notes

1) The original version of this paper was presented and copies distributed at the Third East Asian Regional Conference in Alternative Geography (EARCAG), held in Japan on August 5-9, 2003. The paper was modified and published (Kakita and Yoshinaka 2004). This paper is a further modified version of these previous presentations and publications, based on a paper presented and distributed at the Eighth Asian Studies Conference Japan (ASCJ) held in Japan on June 19-20, 2004.

2) Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (2003). The Japanese version of the report is available on the web.

http://www.mhlw.go.jp/houdou/2003/03/h0326-5.html3) The Japanese version of this report is available on the web.

http://www.mhlw.go.jp/shingi/2003/12/s1216-5v.html4) Study Group of Urban Welfare, College of Social Welfare, Osaka Prefecture University (2002). The

area where the survey was conducted is the whole prefecture except for Osaka City, because in Osaka City a similar survey had already been held in 1999 (Study Group of Urban Environmental Problem, Osaka City University 2001).

The full text and abstract of the report on Osaka Prefecture Survey of 2001 are available on the following web site.

Full text: http://www.sw.osakafu-u.ac.jp/~nakayama/pdf/report.pdfAbstract: http://www.sw.osakafu-u.ac.jp/~nakayama/pdf/report_outline.pdf

5) The strikingly low proportion of females among homeless people in Japan reflects gender bias in welfare policy extended to homeless people and those at risk of falling into homelessness. See Kakita and Yoshinaka (2004) Chapter 3 ‘Rough Sleepers and Gender.’

6) The unemployment rate differs by prefecture. Especially, the rate in Osaka is higher than in other prefectures. According to the unemployment rate covering people who have no work but are employable and seeking work (Kanzen-shitsugyō-ritsu) based on the ‘2002 Employment Status Survey’ (Statistics Bureau, Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications), ‘complete unemployment’ averaged 5.4% in all Japan and 5.9% in Tokyo, but registered 8.6% in Osaka.

7) In this survey, the main purpose to interview about social insurance enrollment was to establish the stability of employment status before becoming homeless. For this reason, the question mainly focused on health insurance and pensions. In future I hope to further examine the topic of unemployment insurance as a basic safety net to protect the unemployed from falling into homelessness.

8) See Tsumaki (2004).9) See Nakamura (2003), and more precisely Kakita (2004).

Bibliography

Kakita, Yusuke, 2004, ‘Supporting Practices for Homeless People by Voluntary Organisations in UK,’ in Kengo Nakamura et al., eds., Ōbei no hōmuresu mondai (ge): Shien no jitsurei [Homelessness in Europe and the USA Volume 2: Examples of Supporting Practice], Kyoto: Horitsu Bunka-sha.


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Kakita, Yusuke and Toshiko Yoshinaka, 2004, ‘General Characteristics of Rough Sleepers through the “National Survey of Homeless People in Japan”,’ in Oita daigaku keizai ronshū [Oita University Economic Review], Vol. 56, No. 2.

Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, 2003, Hōmuresu no jittai ni kansuru zenkoku tyōsa hōkokusho [Report on the National Survey of Homeless People’s Status in Japan].

Nakamura, Kengo et al., eds., 2003, Ōbei no hōmuresu mondai (jō): Jittai to seisaku [Homelessness in Europe and the USA Volume 1: Realities and Policy Reponses], Kyoto: Horitsu Bunka-sha.

Statistics Bureau, Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications, 2002, Heisei 12 nen Kokusei tyōsa hōkoku dai 1 kan: Jinkō sōsū [2000 Population Census of Japan Volume 1: Total Population], Tokyo: Statistical Information Institute for Consulting and Analysis.

Osaka shiritsu daigaku toshi kankyō mondai kenkyū-kai [Study Group of Urban Environmental Problem, Osaka City University], 2001, Nojuku seikatsusha (hōmuresu) ni kansuru sōgōteki tyōsa kenkyū hōkokusho [Report on the General Survey of Homeless People in Osaka City].

Osaka furitsu daigaku shakai fukushi gakubu toshi fukushi kenkyū-kai [Study Group of Urban Welfare, College of Social Welfare, Osaka Prefecture University], 2002, Osaka-fu nojuku seikatsusha jittai tyōsa hōkokusho [Report on the Survey of Homeless People in Osaka Prefecture].

Tsumaki, Shingo, 2004, ‘Preference for Homelessness Categorized as “Refusing a Decent Civic Life”: A Critical Perspective,’ in Shidai shakaigaku [The Annuals of Sociological Association, Osaka City University], No. 5.

Yusuke KAKITAGraduate School of Oita University. [email protected]

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Homeless People in Japan - WordPress.com · ‘homeless people’ refers exclusively to ‘rough sleepers.’ So in Japan, homeless people do not include people who are living in