Emotional Labor in the Public Sector

A Case Study of Livelihood Protection Case Work

Abstract

Due to the recent recessions, the numbers of welfare recipients in Japan has been increasing. Since 2005, more than a million households have been receiving livelihood protection by the Goverment. The tasks of livelihood protection case workers are not only limited to benefit payments but also to help recipients to make an independent living. In other words, they are put to the test of their abilities to rise up to the occasion. Some difficulties, however, are present, which prevent livelihood protection case workers to play in full the important roles they are assigned. First, workder specialties are not taken into account at the time of their recruitment and job posting. In addition, as they are on average in charge of nearly 100 clients, and they are too busy even just to visit the clients let alone to conduct in-depth hearing. Second, newly assigned staffs are untrained and don't have sufficient knowledge and skills to perform their tasks in full. They always perform their task with mounting burdens of anxiety. Third, livelihood protection case work involves emotion management as a skill. But their efforts in emotion management are not sufficiently appreciated and considered. Care work requires “emotional labor,” a term defined by A.R. Hochshild. Emotional labor involves risks which bring about negative effects on care workers, such as burnout syndromes. Emotional management skills should be given much higher values. Moreover, problems that derive from emotional management must be wrestled with not by individual workers but by the organization as a whole.