During his tenure as the governor of Osaka, Ichizou HAYASHI shared the hardship of establishing the Osaka-fu Houmen-iin system with the chief Houmen-iin. Following his retirement he was appointed as an advisor to the Houmen-iin, and he continued to exert his influence over the development of this system. The early chief Houmen-iin were people who exerted considerable regional influence. One such individual was Kaichirou NUMATA, who later became a member of the municipal assembly and the Diet. He also played an active role in formulating and promoting the implementation of the Poor Relief Law. Incidentally, chief Houmen-iin members such as HAYASHI and NUMATA held somewhat different opinions regarding the direction of the Houmen-iin system. The actual direction in which things proceeded depended on the person who dominated the administration of the system. In the end, we can say that HAYASHI dominated the relationship between HAYASHI, NUMATA and other chief Houmen-iin members in the standing committee as well as the campaigns to formulate and promote the implementation of the Poor Relief Law. In other words, HAYASHI's aspiration was realized to a considerable extent. Nevertheless, how HAYASHI and the members of the standing committee evaluated the Houmen-iin system since it was implemented on a nationwide level is a different issue.

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Since 2000, the development of welfare marketization has reduced the regulations and protections of government and has required that social welfare corporations manage themselves independently by self-responsibility. Simultaneously, in recent years, social welfare corporations have been expected more and more to play public roles in order to solve social problems such as "social exclusion" in communities. This means that social welfare corporations will face the dichotomous business challenge of balancing profit-making pursuits and accomplishing nonprofit social missions as well. How should social welfare corporations perform new public roles in communities and still build their raison d'etre in the market? This article presents an overview through the concept of "commercialization of the social welfare corporation" regarding the reform of the management environment in the social welfare corporation by introducing a certain market mechanism. Regarding this new publicness, this study attempted to examine from the viewpoint of a "business domain" (1) customer base, (2) customer functions, and (3) skills that are demanded of the social welfare corporation. Finally, this paper also proposes the social balance sheet as a way to evaluate the social aspects and nonprofit activities of an organization, which are not represented in its own financial statements.

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A variety of debates have taken place regarding the relationship between the Adult Guardianship System and the Support Program for Self-reliance in Daily Life, and fixed views are also apparent in government notifications. That said, a definitive logic in terms of doctrine has yet to be presented. The emphasis of this paper is on discussing the problem of determining the mental capacity of users of the Support Program for Self-reliance in Daily Life. This paper also lays out the argument for using the system and program differently depending on "the amount of effort to provide support." The presumption is that both the system and program will provide support in tandem to users with the most diminished ability to make decisions. In such instances, however, the guardianship system concentrates on support, both in terms of property management and physical custody, while the support program merely serves in a supplementary role. In light of this interaction between the system and the program, the current practice of providing support via the program only to individuals subject to full guardianship (as opposed to limited guardianship or conservatorship) is a situation that must be promptly remedied.

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This study aims to discuss the conditions of child-rearing support at community-based child-rearing support centers, focusing on the relationship between the intended functions of community-based social work (CBSW) and actual practices. The author performed a factor analysis of 27 items of CBSW and 112 items of actual practices. The sample was classified into 4 groups according to the score of each factor, and the relationships among the 4 groups and each factor of actual practice were discussed. As a result, individual characteristics were discovered in the practices of the 4 groups. The high CBSW group engages productively in community-based support activities while adhering to the principles of CBSW. The community-based support-conscious group is aware of CBSW, but does not reflect it in practice. The preventive support group is highly aware of preventive support and engages in such activities at facilities. The low CBSW group is imperfectly aware of CBSW and does not engage in actual activities. Thus, the results necessitate deliberation on whether to accept this situation as the inevitable diversity of practices at centers or to actively improve conditions at these centers so as to realize a more ideal situations.

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The purpose of this research is to examine a care management practice model under the long-term care Insurance System. This paper specifically focuses on and examines the care managers' benefit management tasks that specialize in coordinating and mediating functions. The survey included the participant observation method and interview method. Data were analyzed by the qualitative coding method. The results clarify the structures and processes of benefit management tasks specializing in coordinating and mediating functions from two perspectives, namely the perspective of Care (Case) Management Theory: (1) Give preferences to the use of existing services; (2) Restriction of comprehensive assessments; (3) Promotion of profitability; (4) Evaluation of emphasized outcomes; and (5) Specialization of functions; and the perspective of the long-term care insurance system: (1) Comply with the application of the system; (2) Perform the tasks of calculating costs and managing budget; (3) Require proof of tasks; (4) Move towards a more fluid system; and (5) Delay establishing the criteria for judgment. The results also show that the care management practice model under the Long-term care insurance system requires the following: (1) Integrating the two way process, (2) Making the results more visible, and (3) Promotion of efficiency in benefit management tasks.

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"Self-support program for public assistance" was established, and the work support program for public assistance recipients has been implemented in welfare offices since 2005. "Self Support" for the public assistance recipients has been the subject of focus, but on the other hand their income levels and living conditions have not been researched sufficiently. The authors investigated the households who left the public assistance (Welfare Leavers for employment) in P city, Osaka from 2006 to 2008, and examined their income levels and form of employment. In this paper, we compare our findings (P city survey) with "Comprehensive Survey of Living Conditions" and "Employment Status Survey". As a result, the following points were clarified. 1) Public assistance "Independence" person appears to be changing to working poor because of low income and temporary employment. 2) The households have no choice but to rely on other social security benefits after becoming independent of public assistance.

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This study was designed to examine the actual state, issues, and future possibility of meal delivery services for elderly people by investigating the status in each municipality in Osaka Prefecture, within a setting of problems not evaluated from a governmental perspective. The study methods were cluster analyses and cross table. Municipalities were categorized into five types and the issues were: promoting profit-making companies to go into business involving the "large-scale type", clarifying people requiring support outside of the certification of long-term care need in the "home-visit care type", supporting non-profit organization and resident participation type activities in the "potential demand type", establishment of a flexible policy process in the "lower subsidies type", and reviewing available social-resources in the "community type". The meal delivery service has various functions in addition to ensuring daily meals. Therefore, we propose that when formulating policy, the business evaluation will be improved if we can demonstrate that the meal delivery service is multifunctional and cost-effective when formulating policy.

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The purpose of this study is to investigate the competence transformation process of medical social workers (MSWs) from novice to mainstay based on interviews with 12 MSWs with more than 15 years of experience working for acute-care hospitals. Interview data were analyzed using Modified Grounded Theory Approach. Three stages of storyline were detected as follows. At the first stage, many novice MSWs felt the conflict due to lack of ability for effective practice. A few MSWs did not feel such a conflict owing to cordial support by senior MSWs. At the second stage, almost all MSWs obtained basic practice competence through attending supervision lectures. They also reflected on the limitation of their ability while working at assigned duties. At the third stage, they finally obtained autonomous competence as MSWs-ie, with stable intervention ability, having his/her own stance and ability to establish stable relationships with clients and staff-through attending supervision lectures and performing coordination activities.

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The present study intended to examine the inequalities in terminal care between household income levels. We analyzed 1,265 older persons who died after receiving care from 428 home nursing stations. Five income levels were evaluated by nurses in charge. In low income households compared with higher ones, care capacity was inferior and the ratio of starting home care from compelling reasons was high, while there were few declarations of intent to be attended at their deathbed at home. In the process of care, low income households showed a higher proportion of hospitalization/admission to a care facility due to lack of home care capacity, while frequently utilizing welfare services, in which caregivers often fluctuated in their intention for continuation of the care. Furthermore, even in the outcome of care, attendance to the deathbed at home was lower, at 32.5%, than high income households (57.7%), and the care quality evaluated by caregivers and nurses in charge was also low. In the structure, process and outcome of the terminal care, inequalities were found, in which lower income households received a lower care quality under a difficult environment.

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The facility for mental hygiene consultation, which was set up under the Mental Hygiene Law, is the first legal consultant organization for the mentally disabled in Japan. Although the facility was established, the activities that need to be conducted have still not been clarified. This study clarifies the activities by examining historical documents and a hearing survey of the structures and activities of all 54 facilities. The study period covered in this paper is from 1950 when the facilities for mental hygiene consultation were established to 1965 when they were shifted to the mental health center. As a result of the examination, it was found that there were few organizations focusing on this single function, and the majority of staff had another post to which they were committed. Consequently, many consultation activities could not yield the intended result. The activities were primarily intended for disabled people in the region and were not focused nationwide. However, the study clarified that the small number of facilities for mental hygiene consultation had positively developed through the consultation activities, technical assistance to public health centers, and their original community activities.

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