マスメディアと社会福祉活動(II) : 昭和初期の地域福祉活動・朝日出世資金の創設とその成果について

Japanese news media companies actively carry out social welfare programs. Especially, newspaper companies have created special departments to serve communities in need since the end of the 19th century. The services included, but not limited to, monetary aids for victims of natural disasters, such as earthquakes and typhoons, and those in extreme poverty, providing free primary medical cares, and fundraising campaigns to support such activities. The Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923 and following economic depression spread a sense of social unrest to the entire nation, and numbers of the poor and unemployed had skyrocketed. In order to aid those with financial difficulties, Asahi Shimbun Social Welfare Organization launched "Asahi Social Success Loan"in 1927. The program continued until 1944, and received great recognitions as a non-governmental program from the social welfare field and the federal government. Today, growing gaps between the socio-economic classes are gathering attentions to the necessity and the effectiveness of community welfare movements. This paper will examine the role and effects of the program, which is an example of historical event in the field of social welfare movement, mainly based on newspaper articles. Also, development and implementation of Family Rehabilitation Loan, established in 1955 by both federal and regional government using the "Asahi" as a prototype, will be discussed. The paper aims to investigate how mass media companies based social welfare programs have foreseen and served people with various disadvantages in recent history, as well as to see how the collaboration of journalism and the welfare programs have impacted on the overall development of the area of social welfare in Japanese modern history