Research Institute for High-Life

Summary:
Research into knowledge archives to enrich the new generation urban lifestyle - Part Two

1 Objectives of this research

This research aims to look beyond a new social model while exploring how to reestablish collapsing communities, and to create new communities that match the coming era.

The start line of the research begins from a suggestion in C Alexander’s “A Human City” 40 years ago. In order for the suggestion to be re adapted to the modern city, from the behavior of citizens and citizen groups who have already been engaging in activities, we brought up the idea of extracting activities for optimal adaptation = to regenerate and reestablish the “community” and produce knowledge archives.

In the first year, we classified the themes into the following five subthemes and conducted case research of NPO and citizen activities.

(1) Regional care and creation of places to stay where relief
(2) Another form of housing and how to live
(3) Community renovation through arts and festivals
(4) Creation of places to learn
(5) Conflict resolution in communities

This year, based on the original objectives, we were supposed to conduct case research by adding a new subtheme. However, we confronted significant challenge in Japan in the recovery from the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011. Among a variety of movements addressing this desperate challenge, many cases were reported in which “theme based communities” supported “regional based communities” in the devastated area. It can be said that the disaster triggered the ability that we had to recover through mutual aid. On the other hand, there is no doubt that not only were we disappointed at the countermeasures by the government and specialists in the recovery of the devastated area, including countermeasures after the accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, but also we were all made to feel the emptiness of having to depend on such rigid authorities.

Furthermore, with regard to “(5) Conflict resolution in community” in the previous year, Mr. Ito from ASOBOT concluded the report by questioning whether we should compare and organize the “community” itself, which is the premise of this research, based on the classification of “territorial connection based” and “theme based”. By tracing such paths, we decided to correct the course of the latter research, which is corrected as follows, and reached our conclusions.
Fig. 1 explains the course correction.

As a contemporary global based background, it is recognized that we are heading from the population explosion to an “ageing society with fewer children” through “finiteness of the global environment” such as energy depletion and destruction of the environment. The current situation in Japan has led to “poverty and disparity due to excess production” as a result of efficiency through high economic growth. Although no more growth can be expected, society embraces “a variety of imbalances due to the inevitability of the course of economic growth”. Additionally, with an expectation of a new social system that integrates “capitalism, socialism, and ecology”, political policies are being established in such a way as to be integrated into the communities themselves. However, the content of the political policies established by the government, who cannot change the growing economic based course although it is actually the proper course correction, is such that they cannot help incurring distrust in politics because it disperses pain to people as a result of the collapse of systems and political policies thus far.

On March 11, 2011, we encountered a disaster, the Great East Japan Earthquake. Subsequently, people’s methodology of switching was boosted to the next level in one blow. What has been said is that it is now the political policies that should be integrated back to the community itself, as mentioned above, because the result of the disaster was that it awakened the mutual aid ability that we had. On the other hand, there is no doubt that everyone has come to notice the fragility of the central system that is controlled by politics, economics, laws, systems, and specialists, and also they have come to realize the danger in depending on that.

In return for helping those in need, who lost all their property, it is not possible to receive money. In a sense, many people, for the first time, experienced labor that is released from the system of the market economy, and felt the joy and satisfaction that cannot be obtained with money. It is contemplated that such experience can be applied to various fields. 　

For example, “education” has a “school system” in the center of the system. Outside of that, it is expected that there sporadically exists free “mutual learning” situations. Beyond “trials” that make it impossible to resolve the really necessary conciliations, we feel the need for “extra-judicial conflict resolution” as well as “home care and places to stay” that provide support in areas that cannot be covered by “medical, nursing care, and caregiving, etc.”

An objective of this research is to produce “knowledge archives” for redesigning the “community”, but we determined as a direction that it is important to apply the knowledge that can be interpreted from cases of community activities that place importance on practices of “out-of-dependence”, getting out of dependent tendencies, as the collapse of the safety myth of nuclear power made us aware of independence from nuclear power and provided an opportunity for us to make a judgment on our own to select renewable energy even if the price is high. In other words, it is not to extract easy and convenient “HOW TO”, but to interpret “knowledge” based on the view of finding “WHAT FOR” from the principal perspectives. Thus, although the original research objective is “knowledge to enrich the new generation urban lifestyle”, we corrected the course to produce archives of “life literacy” for people who noticed “out-of-dependence”.

In conclusion, we modified the sub themes of the previous year and decided upon the research results to be obtained according to the following six subthemes.

1. Review of past community theories――the possibilities (Hiroshi Kashiwagi)
2. Roles of arts and festivals that have taken part in the community (Makoto Otake)
3. Ideal situation of “community regeneration” in view of a community’s “Crisis” (Takeshi Ito)
4. Creation of community, placing importance on care―from a perspective of the end of life stage (Kotaro Naganuma)
5. Knowledge toward community regeneration seen from housing and how to live (Yohei Miura)
6. Creation of places to learn (Osamu Tomoda)

Furthermore, aside from this report, as a supplementary report, we have completed “knowledge archives to enrich the new generation urban lifestyle”. From these case reports, as a practitioner of life literacy, you will be able to recognize the current situation, which promotes switching of the feeling of “out-of-dependence”. Please read together with this.

2 Method of research

This year, in contrast to the case studies so far, we read-in activities of people who noticed “out-of-dependence” cross-sectionally through the subthemes, and during the course of this, added the keywords as a footnote. Interviews of further cases were limited to “Idobata Genki”, “NPO Association International Circus Village”, and “Sunwork Kaguya”, but we additionally interviewed the cases in the previous year and supplemented the course correction. Furthermore, aiming for archives, we held an “editorial meeting” and extracted the term “life literacy”, etc., by adding the keywords that exist in the subthemes cross-sectionally as “tags”.
Furthermore, we visited the site of the Great East Japan Earthquake and conducted support activities and interview activities regarding radiation contamination from Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant accident.

At the stage of research conclusion, we held on March 13 in this year the 22nd High Life Seminar “a sign of the coming community- is there knowledge toward changes -”. In this seminar, other than presentations of research results so far, we invited Ms. Atsuko Ikeda, administration officer of “Hitomachi-sha”, which started activities of “seikatsu club coop”, which can be said to be the root of citizen activity in our country around 1970 and created a variety of citizen activities to the present, and had panel discussion. Today, after 40 years since “A Human City”, we interpreted many hints against the challenges “what we should do for community” (see the record of High Life Seminar “a sign of the coming community- is there knowledge toward changes ?“).

Interview activities

The interviews this year were conducted according to the following schedule.

June 21 A home for the elderly, “Idobata Genki” in Kisarazu, Chiba (Naganuma/Tomoda)
July 17,18 Supportive activities of marginal village in Otabu, Chichibu-City (Tomoda)
August 4,5 “NPO Association International Circus Village” in Azumacho, Midori-City, Gunma (Otake/Tomoda)
August 29,30 A welfare facility, “Kinoko Group” in Yamaguchi, Hiroshima, and Okayama (Naganuma)
September 2 Press presentation of the 4th “Koganecho Bazaar” (Tomoda)
September 14 A temporal daycare home for the disabled, “Sunwork Kaguya” in Fujisawa City (Otake/Tomoda)
September 23 - 24 Visits in Tohoku districts (Sendai, Ishinomaki, Kamaishi) (Tomoda, Otake, Naganuma, Sendouda)
October 8 - 10 “Collective Housing Corporation” participates in the national convention (Tomoda/Miura)
October 22,23 Visits in Tohoku district (Miyako City) (Tomoda)
October 31 Interview of the harvest festival at a temporal daycare home for the disabled, “Sunwork Kaguya” in Fujisawa City (Tomoda)
November 5 Participates in “Kussapara Festival” (installation using driftwood) (Otake/Tomoda)
November 25 A lecture of “storyteller”, Ms. Rika Ogawara, a disaster victim, “listening to voice form Fukushima” at Tokyo Zokei University (Otake/Tomoda)

Visit to provisional housings
Regular visits from April 2011 to March 2012
Interview report of a workshop, “class of play by handmade” twice a month (Tomoda)
Supportive activities for the disaster areas of Faculty of Social Work Studies, Josai International University (see the supplement report for more details)

3 Research system

The research this year was conducted according to the following system.

Research plans/coordination [LLP Machi Communication Research Institute]
Hiroshi Kashiwagi (professor, Musashino University of Fine Art)
Makoto Otake (GENDAI Design Laboratory)
Kotaro Naganuma (senior researcher, Bunka Gakuin Creative Media Center)
Osamu Tomoda (LLP Machi Communication Research Institute)
Takeshi Ito (C.E.O, ASOBOTinc.)
Yohei Miura (fellowship, Research Institute for High Life Foundation)

Research partners
Yaeko Matsushita (associate professor, Faculty of Social Work Studies, Josai International University)
Yoko Mori (associate professor, Faculty of Social Work Studies, Josai International University)
Atsuko Ikeda (representative director, higher brain dysfunction support, NPO Association, VIVID, and administration officer, citizen think tank, Hitomachi-sha)

Research Administrator
Shinichi Sentoda (The Research Institute for High-Life Foundation　Chief scientist)

4 Summary of research reports in this year

4-1 Review the past community theories -- the possibilities (Hiroshi Kashiwagi)

This research to consider the possibilities of new communities began April 2010.
In retrospect, since the bubble economy in the 80’s, at least in Japan, discussion regarding community was tenuous. Especially, in the “neoliberalism economy” under the Koizumi administration, there was a strong tendency where economic or social collapse is cleared away by the word “self-responsibility” as an individual problem.

However, on March 11, 2011, an unimagined great disaster occurred. The earthquake disaster, Tsunami, and meltdown from nuclear plant accident presented us an opportunity to think again as the entire society what the community should be or what will be the possibility of new community. In fact, the slogan “Kizuna (bonding)” that was spoken here and there since the great disaster summarizes regeneration and the possibilities of community in the end.

Over discussion regarding the possibilities of new communities, an idea comes up that was very similar to ideas regarding community actively talked over, discussed, and suggested from the 1960’s to the 70’s and the practices to realize them. Furthermore, it recalls the movements by women in the 1900’s as a prototype of those ideas and practices.

Therefore, here, it is an objective to review the ideas and practices of past community theories, organize them, and find clues about whether they are still effective for us living in the modern era.

The ideas and practices of the community that spread from the 60’s to the 70’s is based on the background of “a cultural sense of discomfort to the society by a dominant system” which was created as a result of the excesses of industry and the economy. As a result, “independent sharing of devices, knowledge, and wisdom” was suggested for the dominant system. You can see the features of the practices in the “Whole Earth Catalog” and “A Human City” published from the end of the 60’s to the

Additionally, theoretically, “criticism against the modernistic plans and criticism against the desire to return to classical community” contemporarily suggested by Henri Lefebvre who is a French Socialist also echoes the practice of the urban city in the same era. The plans created by the modern industrial society dilute the basis of the presence of people to “individualism and tendency to become as an atom”. We again need to be independent to participate in the urban city and search for possibilities of the community. However, at the same time, we should not have a “desire to return to classical community”.

Considering that, it is believed that the “concept of the community sharing household” that was developed by the women in the 19th or “phalansterianism as a prototype” there and community housing give us clues.

Furthermore, it is believed that the possibility of temporary community, which was triggered by “poverty, disaster, or conflict” and has been reacknowledged again, gives us a major hint.

The important thing in forming the community may be to adjust and control various distances among independent people.

4-2 Roles of arts and festivals participating in community (Makoto Otake)

Projects to economically develop areas and urban development involving arts or festivals are spread all over Japan. Arts and festivals are force that induces people to go out from home to places where arts and festivals are held. Going out from home means separating each person from the background of home. Separating makes people feel light and allows to behave freely. This is release from the daily routine work. This sense of openness makes people encounter landscapes in towns and villages, experience altering encounters with people in towns and villages, and also develops contacts with other people. People reach, so to say, an awakened state and enjoy such encounters. Vigor emerges in towns and villages. This vigor of people is indeed the aim of projects to economically develop the area and urban development.

Upon interview of arts and festivals that bring vigor to regions or people in regions, the targets that have mechanisms wherever and whoever can join are selected. Therefore, the interviewed arts and festivals are not so famous. It is different from that is planned and operated by famous produces or curators. Rather, it is focused on amateurism that is realistically devised, voluntarily planned and operated. These are cases in which people who normally live in neighborhood get together or people who later joined the region give ideas and bring excitement to the region.

The following are case reports of four arts and festivals.

(1) “Kusappara Festival” which exists as a festival “like a camp” created in the middle of the residential sections. This is a park where residents in the neighborhood voluntarily manage an open space surrounded by precious green in the urban city and make it a place to induce district vigor while maintaining the green.

(2) “Harmonye Exhibition”, “Face of Wonder”, and “Sunwork Kaguya” as an art workshop to open mind. This is an activity to create a place where disabled people can get together and aim for establishing independence through art activities.

(3) “Izu Kogen Art Festival” is an art festival to assist in living. This is an art festival characterized by a group of exhibition places voluntarily planned and voluntarily operated that were devised in order to share and grow the living life in the living life where nature is family that is different from the urban city.

(4) “Koganecho Bazaar” where the conversion of the building changes the arts and the city. This is an activity of the art festival in combination with urban development which started from obtaining a small special amusement building (Brothel) by the government and providing it to NPO Area Management Center in the region.

In many cases, there is knowledge to utilize and reuse the resources such as places and people in the region and this give us a reference to create a sustainable community.

4-3 Ideal situation of “community regeneration” in view of community’s “Crisis” (Takeshi Ito)

In this report, first of all the occurrence of an event in which the community can fall into the most dangerous situation is determined to be “at the time of conflict”. For Japanese people, “conflict” brings an image of “conflict between nations”, but many recent conflicts are a form of conflict called “civil war” between the nation and citizens, or citizens and citizens. Civil war is a “situation where familiar people kill each other” due to political, religious, or ethnical factors, and the restoration process after civil war brings similar context of “community regeneration” such as how enemies with hatred live mutually in the same region again.

Additionally, another danger is determined to be “at the time of disaster”. At the time of normal, such as aging of society, depopulation, industry decline, regional challenges are picked up as community problems, but at the time of disaster, the problems that are underlying at normal times also become visible. Furthermore, in the restoration process at the time of disaster, plans are made from the perspective of “disaster prevention” and “disaster decrease” in order to prevent recurrence. This also applies to the community and it is believed that there is a hint for the regeneration process.

Based on the above, by focusing on cases regarding dangerous situations in the community such as “conflict” and “disaster”, the direction of community regeneration was presented through different approaches, such as “what has functioned and what has not functioned” and “what the community should be in the future”, rather than the recent “community regeneration theory”.

As a result of case consideration, the process of community regeneration can be classified into the related two phases: “restorative phase” and “constructive phase” and respectively their regeneration processes were confirmed.

(1) “Restorative phase” =at the time of emergency
“Meeting” -> “Discussion” -> “Concession” -> “Reconciliation”

(2) “Constructive phase” =at the time of normal
“Greeting” -> “Conversation” -> “Collaboration” -> “Assistance”
The fact that knowledge about the two phases derived here and each of the four stage processes, can be applied in the future as an actual community renewal “evaluation model” is the next challenge.

4-4 Creation of community placing importance on care (Kotaro Naganuma)

This report, focusing on problems of caregiving for the elderly, reviewed and researched the community from the perspective of care, based on practices to create places to stay for the elderly in the region (“Minuma House”, etc.), case studies of healthcare facilities whose specialty is dementia ( “Kinoko Grpup” , etc.), and comparative investigations regarding “regional caregiving ability” that a project team of “NPO Association Kurashi to Okane no Gakko” conducted. The major “knowledge” or “insight” and “challenges” obtained from the case studies and investigation are as follows.

(1) Regional care and community
What we have to confirm first of all is that the community problems from the perspective of care are to review and reorganize the community for the elderly being “outside” of the facilities and housings for the elderly and also the huge elderly group who need life support service “outside” of the coverage of the care insurance. For example, the community comes under pressure to take action for the elderly who can continue their living habits at home but cannot go outside to society and do shopping and for the elderly with dementia walking around the town.

(2) Building of relationship
As one of the conditions that allow regional cases based on caregiving at home, it is important to have a “place to stay” or a “house with mutual aid”. Even reducing the family’s mental burden can avoid a disastrous situation of “caregiving at home” and make it possible to continue. The main purpose of the creation of community is not to create a “container” but to build a relationship, although “having a place” is meaningful for that purpose.

(3) Communication to return to basics
In communication with people with dementia, which is expected to expand increasingly, rather than knowledge aspects that compete transmission efficiency such as meaningful message exchanges, the more basic aspects of communication such as “contact” “sharing of emotion” “listening” “counseling” “validation” are important.

(4) Literacy for “regeneration” for retired men
In 2012, the mass retirement of Japan's baby boomers over 65 years old who have reached retirement age and the “demobilization” to home and regional society begins. There is a concern that a variety of problems will be triggered at home and regions, as the receivers. In order for the elderly men who tend to retreat at home to “regenerate”, it is necessary to learn again some kind of rehabilitation training, i.e. literacy of how to live and behave at home and in the region. It is desirable to have attractive “regional places to stay” where such men can get together.

(5) Variations of “way of living place” for the elderly
With relaxation of regulations, as the private sector has become involved in operation of the facilities for the elderly, a variety of “way of living places” have emerged, between “facilities” and conventional “home care”. When “home care” reaches its limitations and relocation of dwelling is required, establishing facilities or housing communally, managing a shared house in the region where vacancies have increased, or as mentioned below, moving to other regions, are believed to be some of these variations.

(6) Medical care for “home care”
In order to “live safely in a familiar town until the end of life”, it is essential to have home care specialists (visiting doctors), but in most regions, there are no or very few “visiting doctors”. In the research report in the previous year, it was reported that “this problem has not been solved yet”, but institutional reforms of medical care and caregiving in fiscal year 2012, medical rewards for visiting doctors increased, resulting in an increase in the number of visiting doctors in the capital region and the start of collaboration between medical care and caregiving.

(7) Expansion of the regional gap of caregiving ability
It is expected that the regional gap of caregiving ability will increase. The major factors constituting regional caregiving ability are the regional natural environment (accumulation of snow, etc.), historical conditions (progression of aging percentage, etc.), administrative conditions (leadership of autonomous body), market conditions (involvement of private sector), social conditions (movements and volunteer activities of local residents), etc. Among these, considering financial constraints, the voluntary force of local residents is expected to be large.

(8) Moving of the elderly
The regional gap of caregiving ability is likely to cause moving (relocation) of the elderly to more advantageous region. This will be one of realistic choices for the elderly group who concentrate on the capital region.

(9) Aging literacy
It is an important challenge that the many of the current elderly lack knowledge (consciousness) and techniques regarding aging. Although the culture regarding “death” has been accumulated across all ages and cultures, in the face of a perceived unprecedented “life-span extension”, modern people are not ready for “aging”. This is also an educational challenge not only in regions but also at school. Collaboration with temples or churches is conceivable.

4-5 Knowledge toward community regeneration seen from housing and how to live (Yohei Miura)

Japanese society after the war can be said to be the history of a huge population movement from rural areas to urban cities. People strengthened the solidarity with the common intention of “economical grown throughout Japan” and pursing profits from competition brought growth of the economy, and as a result, people pursued economic growth single-mindedly without suspecting that there were increasing profits (share) of individual companies and (nuclear) families. Through the course of time, people have formed the communities of “company” and “(nuclear) family”. These individual communities were tightened with a common intention toward economic growth while pursuing profit of individual communities was reflected in profit for the country. However, as the people’s demand became saturated, the situation where no more economic growth could be expected occurred. At the same time, people started feeling the limitations of the driving force of growth. This is the current situation of advanced nations and capitalistic countries, and this is a “society with too much increased productivity” that growth based society ended up becoming.

This research started focusing on the problems of disparities and poverty and the problems of social security among the problems resulting from such excessively increased productivity. After the war, “productivity” that people single-mindedly continued pursuing toward economic growth became excess production after the passage of a certain period of time, and along with it, employment has followed in the decreasing direction. The decrease in employment created many jobless workers and a new poverty group emerged that had not existed so far. The economic growth that had been believed to enrich people’s lives and promoting the economic growth conversely increased the poverty group and created the enlargement of the gap between the rich and the poor, leading to a basic contradiction.

As the ending of economic growth, the common intention of “economic growth throughout Japan” was lost, so now in order to create a new community in the coming urban city life, it is necessary, as an alternative to that, to create bonding with people not based on the assumption of the common concept of values.

In this report, from the perspective of “housing and how to live”, we consider how the community should be in order to match the coming era. As case studies, activities by the “NPO Association Corrective Housing Corporation” , “NPO Association COCO Shonan” , and “NPO Association Heart Warming House” were picked up, and from these cases, we considered the possibility of creating new communities in order to realize the new generation rich urban life by focusing on bonding among people through way of living places.

4-6 Creation of places to learn (Osamu Tomoda)

Today, how many opportunities do we have to learn something from regional bonding and people around us? As with the youth association in Asakusa Town where festivals are active, it cannot be rare, but how about new residential areas or condominiums in urban areas?

Although as an assumption, we have to clear the definition of the community, “places to learn” in the school system go far beyond the community and become heteronomous, and also the content to be learned have changed to cramming industrial or competitive principal based means. The results have emerged in the form of chaos in school, bullying, truancy, parasuicide, suicide, or psychotic murder. In such a manner, children are appealing to us, saying that it is “hard to live”. And, if adults notice it but cannot change direction, the collapse of the social security places a huge burden on children.

Originally “places to learn” were where there were “people to know” and “people to teach”. There are many “things to know” other than things learned at school.

Today we are starting to see the limitations of social security, and it is the first step toward autonomous communities to obtain individual autonomous “learning” as non-system based action. In some accidents or situation where adjustment is required, people acquire a tendency to judge their own situation flexibly and take an action and modify. It is believed that expansion of yourself, region, and a variety of communities beyond the region starts from “learning about each other”.

This research focuses on “places to learn” resulting from outside of the school system and outside of the area of market economy.

First of all, as historical background, we take an overview of the movements in “alternative schools” resulting from places to learn that are alternatives to the school system; this originated in the modern era, as well as “charter schools”, which originated in the frustrated U.S. Also, we predict now the challenges of “alternative schools” in Japan. Particularly, we realize that “alternative schools”, not in the sense of “guarantees for free learning”, place emphasis on activities of law systems (school systems as measures for rescuing children, and it is important to promote paying attention widely to the former. We capture this in the term “learning about each other” and consider the literacy of learning from each other through the following cases.

(1) “learning from each other” through “blossoming of people” “Shibuya University”
(2) “learning from each other” through “place to stay” “Idobata Genki”
(3) “learning from each other” through “body” “International Circus Village”
(4) “learning from each other” through “play” “street watching” , “Kussappara Festival”
(5) “learning from each other” through “carry on the tradition” “Tkachiho Kagura”

We conclude that rehabilitation to reconstruct the sickened society is “learning from each other” while expanding the life literacy of citizens to change from the tendency of individualism like an atom to a dimension that is not based on the growth principle.

May 2012
Research Institute for High-Life Foundation