社団法人やどかりの里

Japanese mental health services
and
community-based service agency "Yadokari-no-sato"

1) "Yadokari-no-sato" (Literally translated " Village of Hermit Crabs")
YADOKARI-NO-SATO is a non-profit organization that provides services to persons (mainly chronic schizophrenia) so that they can lead their life in their own way in the area. Yadokarinosato also promotes mental health welfare activity through publication, training and research. Activity foothold is Saitama City, Saitama Prefecture that is located next to Tokyo. The City has about one million population. Activity began in 1970 by offering a house and a place of work to mental health consumers who were discharged from hospitals, but had no place to work. It can be said that YADOKARI-NO-SATO is a pioneer in this field in Japan. From the start of operation, there have been many visitors from various places. In the first 20 years of operation, there was no government subsidy. The operation was run with the enterprise fund, and we always had financial problems. In 1987, Mental Health Law was revised in Japan and regulated for the first time "Social Return Institution System" for mental disorder persons. In accordance with the revised law, "Yadokari-no-sato" established various " psychosocial rehabilitation programs" (Daily Life Training Institute and Vocational Training Institute) in 1990 and later added Social Support Center, Work Shop, and Group home, which are scattered in the area. Currently, approx. 200 people (At Yadokari-no-sato, they are called "Member") are registered at five Life Support Centers and some of them moved into Group Home and work at the Community Work Shops. Others live together with their family and commute to Yadokari-no-sato participating in activities. They are using the facilities various ways.

2) History of "Yadokari-no-sato"
<1970 to 1989>
Mental hospital has operated as institution and provided custodial care for psychiatric patients since 1950. There are 340,000 people are still in hospitals, and 1/3 are hospitalized with reasons so called social hospitalization.About 90 percent of the psychiatric hospitals in Japan are private.This means that there is no place to go, and they are in hospitals. Average hospitals days is about 500 days. Yadokari-no-sato started when a social worker of a hospital was moved by a voice of a patient. "I want to leave the hospital", and he searched a place for the patient to live and work. In those days, the mental disorder person facilities were of socially defensive nature and a mental disorder person was not included for social welfare care. Naturally, the law did not endorse activities by Yadokari-no-sato at that time and there is no public fund available for our operation. For the first 20 years of operation, the major sources of income for the operation were member fee of the foundation members, facility users' fee, incomes from publication and printing, and training courses. It was the time that the activity continued to exist by self-efforts of the foundation. The main activity at the beginning stage of Yadokrinosato was making friends among members, supporting and encouraging each other and providing the scene of comfort and rest. Mental Health Act was revised in 1987 as the result of Utsunomiya Hospital Case (Inhuman medical care and nursing were conducted and a person died from lynching in the hospital). Setting of rehabilitation programs became regulated in the law for the first time in Japan. Along with the change of the law, Yadokari-no-sato started construction of facilities for "social return" activity. Operation of halfway house (Daily Life Training Institute and Vocational Training facilities) started in 1990.
<1990>
With the Mental Health Act reform, these facilities were built, but they were not enough for mental disorder persons to live in an area. Development of the new resources was necessary, such as work place and place to live, and the life support system was gradually formed. With the operations of new rehabilitation facilities, more and more long-term hospitalization persons left the hospital and started to use facilities of Yadokari-no-sato living in an area.The new system meant a change of support, namely to provide support so that they could like in the community with psychiatric disabilities. Also they members can create close relationship with the facilities such as Life Support Center, Group Home and Work Shop are scatted in the area. With the recent Mental Health Act reform, more social rehabilitation services have been added under the law.However, most are run by private enterprises. There was very little number of public institutions. This is a characteristic in Japan that many of the rehabilitation facilities are run by private hospitals. This is connected with the history that private mental hospitals took over the public responsibility for persons with psychiatric disorders. About 100 years ago, when modern psychiatry was introduced in Japan, there was a plan of public mental hospital construction, but priority was given to the private enterprise. Since then, the government adopted policies that were advantageous to the private enterprises forcing them to take over the public responsibility. The law was revised and the government policy was changed, and the medical corporation had to construct the social return facilities for the mental disorder persons.
<1997>
While Social Support activity of Yadokari-no-sato spread through, it has become clear to us about what our activity should be. From those days, we began to think that our existence should be changed from one to be helped by the area, but to one to contribute to the area. And a welfare factory, YADOKARI JOUHOUKAN was established and the new relation between working members and staffs was born. That is not a relation between service providers and receivers, but a new relation between staff and members as same workers.In Work Shop and Vocational Training Center, it has brought consciousness change to the existence that we can contribute to the area. As activities such as a coffee Shop in a town and a Meal Service Center to senior citizens and handicapped persons spread, members have become leading figures of such activities.
<1998>
Yadokari-no-sato traditionally heard voices of members, and its activity reflected those voices. It was, however a reality that a specialist, mainly the social worker took initiative and promoted activity. The activity development conducted under the leadership of the founder, the social worker has reached a limit with expansion of activity for the past several years, and various problems of the organization have been clarified. We have conducted a series of training seminars, and identified the present problems and future tasks. Each member is now voluntarily involved with the activity and becomes conscious about democratic operation of Yadokari-no-sato and we are now in the middle of change from the staff-centered activity to group work by the members and staffs. The activity to create together is to share information by the members and staff, to learn mutually and to repeat dialogue on the basis of mutual understanding. It seems an ineffective way to decide activity , but we believe that it is very important to create a base for democratic activity.

3) What Yadokari-no-sato thinks about currently?
Recession after collapse of the bubble economy at the beginning of 90's continues in Japan and the movement to push reformation of the government structure appears. A field of social welfare and social services is not an exception and administration costs will be reduced and utilization of vitality of the private sector will be introduced. This is the movement to bring market economy principle or to gives priority to the efficiency and profits in the social welfare that require high public responsibility. We feel a danger in this trend, because the current Japanese welfare is not fully regulated in respect of social resources and system. On the other hand, there is a switch in the structure of politics from centralization of power to decentralization, but the method is top down system, and there is the situation of the Japanese politics that a policy is not made of a viewpoint of local community. In addition to the welfare matter, we think that learning of politics and economy is urgent business when we will push forward community improvement on the basis of democratic administration at Yadokari-no-sato. Three cities in this area have merged in May 2001 and become Saitama City, where Yadokari-no-sato is located. Because of the amulgamation of three cities, Saitama city has to develop a welfare plan for persons with disabilities. In this situation, Yadokarinosato is also developing a plan putting our own organization taking feasible mental health consumers in the area into consideration.We believe it is important that we maintain the value of Yadokarinosato that we create a community of persons with mental illness. In order to do so, participation in a policy development process of mental disorder persons themselves is indispensable.

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