Nonprofit Organization Law (1998) and Public Long Term Care Insurance Law (1999)have stimulated the rapid growth of Nonprofit Organizations in Japan. This paper discusses why and how this took place. After examining the theory, definition and functional analysis by Ralph Kramer on Voluntary Organizations, I developed a categorization of welfare NPOs' functions. They are (1) vanguard function, (2) improver/advocate, (3) value guardian and, (4) service provision. Then I applied this categorization to the “Care Nonprofits in Japan ( defined as NPOs providing care services under the Public Long Term Care Insurance Law ) ”. Care NPOs have typical characteristics and functions of Kramer's theory. Why has this happened in the field of welfare and Public Long term Care Insurance? My view is that most of successful Care NPOs have begun providing voluntary care services for the elderly in community before NPO law and Public Long Term Care Insurance Law. They emerged outside Japanese statutory Social Welfare system, and have had reputation for responding to unmet needs in the community. They developed different organizational characters and salient leadership styles. Therefore, if the institutional and legal infrastructure had established, Care NPOs will assume new roles in the future. I also discuss the problems and challenges the NPOs currently face in Japan. Comparing the rise of research paper regarding NPOs in the US, I overlook and discuss the research agendas of Welfare Sociology in this field.

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This paper presents on analytical framework approaching to the human service NPOs sociologically by analyzing their organizational characteristics. This paper focuses on the community-based social welfare service associations and summarizes the three surveys conducted in the past. The findings are: (1) the service providers (care workers) and the service clients live in the same local community and they participate in the same organizations, and the reciprocity of services, (2) approximately 70% of the associations indicated that they experienced certain forms of service reciprocity at varying extent, (3) 17.4 % of the service clients and 14.3% of the service providers have such an experience. This structure is effective from “Trust” point of view which is essential for the human service. The examination on the organizational characteristics of the reciprocity will cast new light on the issues of social capital from sociological viewpoints.

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The purpose of this paper is to examine the changing relationship between the role of government and the activities of nonprofit service providers, focusing on the area of long-term care for the elderly in Japan. The findings are as follows.
First, organizational isomorphism among service providers seemed to take place. While the organizational isomorphism in the US was based on the commercialization of 501 (c) ( 3 ) organizations, the organizational isomorphism among Japanese private service providers stemmed from the demand to all service providers to operate following the standards set by the central government.
Second, some nonprofit service providers were pursuing the possibility of expanding their activities to more profitable areas, which seemed to serve as a leverage to deepen the stratification between the highly commercialized nonprofit service providers and those that were not. I observed that the mechanism of the orgalzational isomorphism among the Japanese nonprofit service providers would resemble to the US-type mechanism once the commercialization is established.
Third, the Japanese central government obtained the legitimacy to wield influence over local governments and private service providers for the purpose of assuring equity in public services. My view is that the legitimacy would be undermined when the stratification proceeded.
Finally, the relationship between the nonprofit service providers and clients showed signs for changes as indicated in the preceding studies in the US.

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This paper examines the dynamic nature of the British welfare state by analysing recent reformist programmes in the field of health care and personal care services. It draws special attention to some policy alterations in service supply and its regulatory regimes incidental to a change of government.
Section 2 defines the notion of the quasi-market system of service provision and discusses the factors underlying the introduction of this mechanism. Sections 3 and 4 explore some significant features of health care and personal care reforms under the Conservative Party Administration. Section 5 evaluates the new Labour Party's attempt to make their policies distinctive from those of their Conservative predecessors. The Conservative Party's ‘decentralised’ regulation was successful in privatising service supply and strengthening the central government's power and influence over the service system. However, it did not result in improved efficiency of services. The neo-liberal approach adopted by the Conservative Party has been replaced by a democratic empowerment approach under the new Labour Administration. The new Labour Party has adopted several aspects of the Conservative Party's reforms, whilst at the same time it has introduced some major changes. The once ‘centralised’ government, which disguised itself as a ‘decentralised’ system would now appear to be less coercive and more consensual. Competition among service suppliers has been converted to that among local authorities.

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This article surveys welfare studies in Italy since the 1990's, focusing on the typological arguments stimulated by G. Esping-Andersen.
First, in 1993, M. Ferrera's book proposed a unique framework of four types of welfare states, into which the characteristic of Italian welfare state was considered the strong clientelism. This taxonomy, however, has been metamorphosed into another set of four types in 1998, after studying the Tentative Model of the Southern European welfare state. Secondly, in 1994, C. Saraceno pointed to the “ambivalent familism” of the Italian welfare states. One of her students, M. Naldini, has recently published a comparative analysis on the family and welfare states in Italy and Spain, based on the “Mediterranean Kinship solidarity model”. Those studies, which are complementary with one another, can also be contextualized into the international accademic trends. Thirdly, P. Donati, one of the most authentic Catholic writers, has elaborated his welfare society model, inspired by the so-called “subsidiarity principle” of the social doctrine of the Catholic Church.
Finally, an oft-quoted notion that the “stateness” is lacking for the Italian welfare regime is examined.

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The European welfare states have been developed with their own national cultures and traditions. However, the recent social policy of the European Union seems to influence more on the individual welfare states to reform their present social security and the social welfare systems in the process of European integration policy. How far has the EU social policy influenced on the individual welfare state? What trend can we find in the recent reform of the welfare state?
This article examines the characters of European Union social policy, and it sinfluences on the recent reform policy of the Dutch welfare state.
After the Amsterdam Treaty, the Lisbon strategy in 2000 was a turning point in social and economic policies in the EU member states. The goal of the EU is expressed as follows: “to become the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world, capable of sustainable economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion ”. Then, the strategy aims at establishing an “activating ” welfare state which gives priority to labor force mobility to eliminate poverty and social exclusion.
The Netherlands is often called the “hybrid ” welfare state of the social democrat and corporatist model. In parallel with the Lisbon strategy, however, the Dutch welfare state reform is open to the liberal views. For example, instead of social protection policy, the individualized life course scheme is emphasized. Also, the privatization of social insurance schemes and “workfare ”policies have changed the landscape of the Dutch welfare state.
As well as the positive views, some challenging com m ents on the recent policy reforms have to be clarified such as the inconsistency of policies new and old. Thus, I conclude that the Dutch welfare state is at the crossroads: whether to maintain its traditional characteristics or to become more “activating ” welfare state, and a compromise between the EU social policy and the national traditional policy will be the one of the keys to study the types of the welfare state.

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The research on social policy and welfare states is currently expanding its research territories. For instance, the research on social welfare in Asian countries has become one of the main objects in recent academic field. As the scope of this research field expands, analytical methods and theoretical implications have to be more precise and multiple approaches for them are in need. Considering these research tendency, I examine the trend. of social welfare in South Korea, and hope to contribute to a comparative study of welfare states.
In this paper, I first discuss the social welfare policy, design of social welfare policy, and research topics on them. And second, I draw out some implications related to the sociology of social welfare. Regarding social policy, the social problem of aging and social inclusion is examined using the report of national strategy for these problems. Second, I compare the function and provability of 'Productive welfare' and 'Participatory welfare' which were the designs of social welfare policy during the regimes of Kim Dae-Jung and Roh Moo-Hyun. In the discussions on the Productive welfare and the Participatory welfare, the ideal relationship of social capitalism, democracy, and social welfare was mentioned. Finally, the diversification of research themes and methodology and the diversification of backgrounds of researchers are discussed. This discussion clarifies topics common characters in the study of social welfare between Japan and South Korea.

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