Comparison of User Participation in Child Day-care Services between Japan and Denmark

This research is derived from various problems of Japanese child care services. It is necessary to broaden the services, but also to establish the foundation of institutional framework to provide more stable services. In 2015... [ view full abstract ]

This research is derived from various problems of Japanese child care services. It is necessary to broaden the services, but also to establish the foundation of institutional framework to provide more stable services. In 2015 the new system of child care services will be implemented in Japan, called The Comprehensive Support System for Children and Child-rearing, because of a shortage of the number of child day-cares. In the new system, the needs for providing child-rearing support services for local communities are pointed out. The concept of co-production must be crucial when they try to enrich services. Providing the services should be discussed from both quantitative and qualitative perspectives.
I deal with Danish and Japanese cases in participating in day-care services. I focus on Danish parent’s boards referring to the concept of co-production and dimensions of parent’s participation.
The main research questions in my research is: how the user participation, the user influence and co-production are effective in social services for children and their families?

The main theoretical frameworks I use in this project are the concept of co-production and Danish user democracy.
As for the theory of co-production, previous studies focused on the third sectors as co-producers in welfare states. Pestoff (1998: 2009) indicated his expectation for the social economy, such as volunteer groups and parent’s coop to promote user influence. Vamstad (2007) stated there are three dimensions of participation from Swedish child care research; social, economic, political participation. He stated the third sectors such as parent’s coop enable user participation since they have direct channels for democratic influence. The political participation means having an influence on the decision making process.
Danish user democracy will be considered comparative point of view. In comparison with the other Scandinavian countries, they tend to attach importance to user’s decision as we can see the user boards are mandatorily set in various institutions and social services in Denmark. The idea has some aspects in common with co-production.

The research methods I use are qualitative interviews and literature survey.
I planned and implemented interviews covering the parent’s boards in Danish day-care services. It showed that parent’s boards at Danish day-care centers have the function of political participation in their process of decision making. Some of the qualitative interviews are implemented in Japanese day-care service run by parents’ group, which is informal, voluntary activity.
The analysis can show the difference between Danish and Japanese systems, how the actors around the social services including families collaborate, and what kind of care packages can be served in each country. I also have possible access to statistic materials provided by the previous studies in child welfare field.

This research aims to seek out the direction for child welfare policy while focusing on the importance of co-production in welfare states. Co-production is based on the concept of collaboration between service providers, professional occupations, and parents. My research is mainly dealing with Danish and Japanese childcare systems. It focuses not only on the child day-care services provided as a services for working mothers, but as comprehensive social services for families.
In this study I attempt to analyze the institutional framework which enables existing co-production to provide social services. In this research, co-production will be considered as the idea of user democracy. In compare to Danish user board system, the voluntary day-care groups in Japan is described.
The contribution I expect to obtain through this project is to offer one example of institutional framework of co-production, especially in childcare system. We can see some points in common between Japanese cases and Danish ones, though there are many differences in their social policies as well. It helps to understand what can be the factors of promoting co-production, the families and professionals and community citizens.