The Child Care Support Needs and the Public Aids : its Characteristics and the Administrative Correspondences from Social Aspects.

2003 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

• Project/Area Number: 12610166
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: 社会学(含社会福祉関係)
• Research Institution: IWATE UNIVERSITY
• Principal Investigator: TAKEMURA Sachiko Iwate University, Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences, Associate Professor, 人文社会科学部, 助教授 (20203929)
• Project Period (FY): 2000 – 2003
• Keywords: child care support / local governments / the prefectural capital / 子育て支援 / 地域社会計画 / 保育

Research Abstract

The aim of this study is to know what kind of the child care support should local city governments offer to the users. Investigating this subject, we should select the object, the local city governments, because there are divers cities on financial budgetary size, social welfare policy and social situation of child care. Therefore, our object city is not large city such an ordinance-designated city but the prefectural capital city. At first comparative study of the prefectural capital cities is conducted on their organizations and financial budget. Then Morioka city as a case city is adopted to investigate the child care support in detail.
In comparative study of the prefectural capital cities there are three findings as follows. First, the child care support is not a critical issue of local policy in the city where the birth rate is decreasing year after year, in spite of the promotive policy of the support in national level. Therefore it is the budgetary appropriation is diminutive in local level. Second, the size of the budget for the child care support is not an appropriate indicator to discover the city in which an unique support policy exists. Because actors in this field are not only local governments, but also NPOs and City Council of Social Welfare. Third, it is important to evaluate the support as a whole in the local area. How to evaluate it appropriately is a next important assignment in this study.
A case study is a qualified way to investigate the child care support in detail. We interviewed the users of the child care support in Morioka city and its surrounding towns. The mothers who take the child care class need not only to know nursing but also to acquire a social companionship, to make a friendship, because they feel solitude in their child caring. It is an important service for local governments to offer the place where mothers make a friendship. It is a latent function in the child care class for the city government to offer a social companionship to the users.
Our findings in this study suggest two points as follows. First, to develop an appropriate evaluation way for the child care support is needed in this field. Second, the users' needs for the child care support should be developed not only on manifest function but also on latent function.