In the 20th Century most democratic industrialized countries have strived to be a "welfare state". Social policy planners, including politicians, scholars (if refered British models, Beveridge, Titmuss, T.H. Marshall, Tawney and others) contributed and invented tools. Those are social scurity system, social insurance and public assistance ; social services in health,housing, education, personal social service, often with positive discrimination ; full-employment policy ; reditribution policy by inheritance tax and progressive income tax ; and workers protection law etc. The root of the "welfare state" is to eliminate absolute poverty of its nation at least. We have succeeded in it to some extent in the developed countries. Despite many problems and dissatisfaction remains, basic orientation to "welfare state" survived. But when we turn to global situation, states which can be called by the name are still minor. There remains enormous (more than one billion) absolute poverty on the earth. When the welfare state idea is extended, a definition of "welfare world" must be that every people who is born on the earth has a right to live minimum meaningful life (world citizenship). We must mobilize our idea and tactics to make "welfare world" to be realized in the 21st century ,as we have succeeded in to establish "welfare state" in the 20th century. We must invent new world social policy. It will largely confront to world economic policy, and one of the most important points will beto control multinational corporations. Most urgent problems or even crises which humankind faces today could be summarized as 3W : Want (starving, absolute poverty and population explosion) ; Waste (earth scale destruction of environment) ; War (crazy killings and refugees discharge). Those are all closely interrelated. We must attack them simultaneously and systematically. The models invented so far are models mainly applicable to industrialized countries. They can not be applied directly to the developing or underdeveloped countries. And when thinking about the capacity of earth, it may be impossible for all nations to develop life styles at the same level as present developed countries enjoy. We might have to change our approaches to social development drastically. Some developed countries might have to lower their standards of living in several critical respects.We must understand and respect each other's diversity and learn to coexist. People have rights to live in their own culture peacefully. We must secure a safe earth environment cohabiting with other creatures too. Strategically and logically, if each country became a "welfare state", a "welfare world" can be simply and readily established. But even within the United Nations, there are many oppressive non-democratic goverments, so it is not realistic to expect too much from state initiatives. There must also be roles and tasks of NGOs in the context of a more internationally cooperative civil society. Emerging "information society" offers some grounds for optimism in this respect.

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In the past decade, interest in international social work^2 has been heightened in Japan. In the remaining years of the 20^<th> century and in the first few decades of the 21^<st> century, the interest will increase further. International social work seems to have been accepted as a field of social work, but what international social work actually is has not yet been agreed upon at all. This paper aims at contributing to the construction of an internationally acceptable concept of international social work through a review of recent discussion in Japan on this topic. In Section 1, we review practice and research being conducted under the name of international social work. In Section 2, we argue that this current work is not necessarily international social work and present an alternative definition of the concept. In Section 3, we discuss where we are now in the development of international social work, and turn the definition into a working definition which fits today's developmental stage. And in the last section, we call readers' attention to the future direction of international social work using Japan's involvement in Asia as an example.

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This thesis intends to discuss the five basic issues of the social work profession in Japan. The situation of Japanese social workers have been changed largely since 1987 when "The Certified Social Work er and Care Worker Law" has been issued. However it is said that these five issues are still basic ones today. In this article five dichotomies will be used which have previously been used by persons in the field of social work. These dichotomies, reflecting controversies in the social work profession, will give you an image of the recent position of social work or social welfare in Japan, which is quite different from that of the United States. Social work has not yet been recognized as a profession in Japan and, accordingly, many of these dichotomies center around the issue of professionalization.

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The Great Hanshin Earthquake on Jan. 17, 1995, struck Kobe City, its neighboring cities and Awajishima island, and inflicted a great deal of devastating destruction. More than 6,400 people were killed and 250,000 houses collapsed or were burned. The quake revealed the vulnerability of the modern urban infrastructure and citizen's livelihood as well as the defectiveness of disaster response measures. Victims were largely made up by the elderly and people belonging to the lower income bracket. The administration's response tended to be delayed in grapsing the situation of elderly and disabled people and in taking prompt measures. The backwardness of housing, residential homes and home care services exacerbated the disaster. The shortage and lack of care for elderly and disabled people in shelters led to the deterioration of their conditions. The people who lost houses moved to prefabricated temporary housing units constructed largely in the outskirts areas of each city, in which 165 solitary fatalities (including suicides) among people living alone occurred as of July 22, 1997. In the aftermath of the quake, over a million volunteers headed by young persons from all parts of the country rushed to the disaster-stricken areas to help the victims. In some areas where community-based welfare activities by local residents had been developed, forming neighborhood networks, local residents themselves were active in tackling the quake disaster, including rescue and relief activities and fighting the fires. Residential homes, day service centers and their staff contributed in the disaster relief. 21/2 years have passed since the quake, however, neither restoration of housing nor reconstruction of the needy people's lives have been much in progress. Measures to support the lives of the victims are urgently needed, especially providing individual compensation, low-priced housing and securing employment. Building a livable and safe welfare community in each area through local residents' initiative should be promoted to ensure urban restoration and to protect against disasters. This article describes crucial lessons learned from the Great Hanshin Earthquake on community social services, including negative and positive aspects. The Hanshin quake has brought about the biggest urban disaster Japan has experienced after the Second World War. The character of disaster problems and response measures differed from the emergency stage (in the aftermath of the quake) to the relief stage (roughly untill the end of March 1995) and the restoration and reconstruction stage (thereafter).

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There are several correlations between the ideology of ageing and ideological aspects of socio-gerontology. In this article the word "ideology" includes religion, ethics, norm and value. It focuses on dual structures of ageing, for example, the world of daytime and also the world of nighttime in the life of the aged. Considering the historical and social background, the attitude of people to ageing and death has changed. Especially, with industrialization and urbanization of modern society, two things are happening. First, the administration of ageing and death is advancing. The aged are separated sometimes from their children to get care, and professional agencies do it. Secondly, the problem of ageism is a very large one. At the same time, the mutual fantasy of an ageless society in the young generation is the big question for all people. Therefore, the conflict between the older generation and the younger generation is becoming severe, and it is very difficult to coordinate each generation. Of course in the beginning of socio-gerontology, sympathy to the aged and protection for the aged existed. But now, we need two new ideologies, i. e., ideology of supporting care and one that creates post care. At the moment we should synthesize fairness and science in the field of sociogerontology.

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This paper deals with how to conduct group work based on faith in Buddha (Amitabha) which aims at the development and improvement of one's character. The members of groups formed for the accomplishment of this aim are helped to have a profound awareness of themselves as human beings through their interaction. Aid is provided by Buddhist priests with are conducted by making the most of group dynamics, the members' innate Buddhahood is stimulated and they are led to embrace faith in Buddha, deepen their religeious faith, cultivate their character and live immaculate lives. This paper aims at giving a systematic and concrete description of group work for this purpose. In Buddhist group work carried out with the support of Buddhist priests, that is, experts in Buddhism, importance is placed on helping the participants with the cultivation of their mind oand the solution of poblems related to their lives. I am convinced that such activeties will eventually contribute to the religious edification of people and the spread of more constructive and practical Buddhism. This paper is identical with the one read at the 18th Symposium of the Association for the Advancement of Social Work with Groups, Inc., an international professional organization.

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Western concepts of self-help were developed in unique Western culture : in Judeo-Christian, individualistic, and pluralistic culture. To use these concepts in Japanese culture effectively, we remove peculiar cultural factors from them, and identify basic elements and processes of self-help groups which are universally effective in various cultures. They are sponteneous sharing [wakachiai], individual independence [hitoridachi], and emancipation from suppression [tokihanachi]. However, Japan's long history of isolation and feudal suppression generated peculiar groupism or group-oriented culture. The basic elements and processes of self-help groups are prone to be distorted by Japan's group-oriented culture, which values emotional cohesiveness, non-individualism, homogeneity, hierarchy, and the particular patterns of their social behaviors. Additionally, we identify political obstacles to the development of self-help groups in Japan-they are lack of pluralism and centralization of administrative power. People avoid becoming political minorities under the cultural pressure, and they have respect for the governmental authorities.

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