This article explores the changing nature and patterns of the ‘generational contract’, with particular reference to the exchange of nursing care and housing assets between older parents and their adult children. Inheritance practices and attitudes are used to examine the ways in which socio-economic, demographic and policy changes have recently altered the conventional arrangements in Japanese society. The previously defined ‘generational contract’ is now ambiguous, and the expectations and obligations of different family members are fragmented. This article also discusses whether such practices in Japan are unique and the ways in which they differ from the English situation. Family obligations and inheritance have been more explicitly connected in the Japanese social and legal systems, while in England there is neither legal obligation to support older parents nor any constraint on inheritance. This article elucidates the similarities and differences in the patterns of inheritance and thus the exchange models between care and inheritance in the two societies.
Debates around welfare change have tended to concentrate on the balance between market and state provision. Although there is increasing reference to a mixed economy of welfare, this generally signifies a greater emphasis on a third sector of voluntary/community level provision. However, the family sphere has been, and still remains, an important and dynamic source of welfare provision across changing regimes and between generations. With this as background, the article addresses three particular questions. First, how has the role of families in the welfare mix changed over time? Second, how do family 'strategies' adapt to structural changes in order to maximize collective/ individual benefits in certain areas and how do these strategies evolve over generations? Third, is such family engagement in welfare influenced by policy shifts appropriately conceptualized as 're-familization' or 'de-familization'? These issues are explored in the comparative socio-economic and cultural contexts of China and Japan and draw on qualitative research with three generations of families in Shanghai and Tokyo.
A BSTRACT The prim ary objective of this pape r is to provide a qualitative analysis of the transform ations in the housing choices and living arrange m ents of olde r pe ople in Japan. The unde rlying causes and issue s of chang ing interge ne rational linkage s were explored in the conte xt of the de ve lopm ent of the Japanese welfare state. The ® eldw ork w as cond ucted in Kitakyushu, Jap an, through a series of interview s w ith olde r w omen. The inform ants were selected from three different welfare sectorsÐ the state, the m arket, and the fam ilyÐ in orde r to m ake a clear distinction am ong people in term s of the ir socio-econo m ic status, housing and living arrange ments, and degree of fam ily relations. The results of the ana ly sis highlight olde r pe ople's p reference for m ore inde pe nde nt living w ith chang ing fam ily patterns and ide ology. It is, how eve r, still constraine d by the limited housing alterna tives and unde rde ve lope d social services. The paper also reve als the extent of pove rty am ong single w omen in old age .
Despite the fact that women's rights have been increasingly defined as equal to men's in law and policy, in post-Second World War Japan women continue to be at a disadvantage in many aspects of social and economic life. Drawing from a survey of 2,205 Japanese women, this article focuses in particular on women's home ownership as a new catalyst behind increasing social stratification in Japan. The women's experiences are closely linked to Japan's institutional ‘familism’: the development of social policy that has been explicitly connected to the male-breadwinner model. We argue that a wide range of institutional and policy practices – mortgage provision, property ownership, social security and taxation and labour market mechanisms – has combined to define the housing asset status of women. We discuss the women's current housing asset portfolio, and also recent socio-economic changes that have begun to redefine their position in a home-owning society. The case of Japan – a patriarchal but shifting home-owning democracy – contributes to our understanding of the contemporary dynamics of women's interaction between family, work and housing in the institutional context.
While the majority of households in England have become homeowners at the turn of the 21st century, some older people still struggle on low incomes in the less privileged sector of private renting. This article first explores the intertwining of the history of housing policy and provision with the lifecourse histories of individuals, seeking to describe the reasons why some older people are in the private rented sector. It then presents research findings that revealed how some older private tenants experienced different types and degrees of harassment and abuse by their landlords, from verbal and financial abuse to disrepair of property and illegal evictions. Both strands are brought together in looking beyond individual responsibility or culpability to the structural and lifecourse causes of the problems. People's housing choices and destinations are often shaped by a combination of their lifecourse circumstances and external (both economic and institutional) barriers. Where abuse is concerned, a two-tier tenancy system has made ‘regulated tenants’ vulnerable to their landlords; the legal remedies are endemically inappropriate; the housing benefit system is a major source of tension between landlords and tenants; and the modernised private rented sector has allowed no place for those who want secure long-term homes. In summary, this article examines how the law, housing policy and the housing market combine to produce particular problems for older private tenants.
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