Mamoru Akahira
Director, Network of Supporters of Disabled People and Others for Whom Life is Hard

1. Preventing repeat offences is the result, not the goal

Right at the outset, I have inadvertently come up with a title which might be misunderstood as denouncing this edition’s featured topic, “Preventing Repeat Offences”. In fact, this assertion is one which I made in the conclusion of an article that I wrote for the September 2016 issue of Normalization, which focused on “support for people for whom life is hard” (*Editor’s Note). Five and a half years on, my thinking has not changed. I would like to use this space to explain why it is unchanged.

In October 2016, the Network of Supporters of Disabled People and Others for Whom Life is Hard (usually known as the Life is Hard Network) was officially launched as a general incorporated association. In December the same year, the Act for the Prevention of Recidivism came into force. The aim of this Act was, I quote, “by facilitating the smooth reintegration into society of persons who have committed offenses while gaining the understanding and cooperation of the people ... to prevent the people from becoming victims of crime and contribute to bringing about a society in which they can live safely and with peace of mind”. Its basic principles are summarized as “1. Securing the employment opportunities and housing needed by people who have committed offences when they reintegrate into society. 2. Enabling them to receive the necessary guidance and support without interruption after reintegrating into society. 3. The importance in preventing recidivism for people who have committed offences of understanding the feelings of their victims and making their own efforts to reintegrate into society. 4. Implementing policies effectively based on research results, etc.” However, although the phrase “coordination with private-sector organizations and with other persons concerned” occurs several times within the provisions of all the 24 clauses and the supplementary articles, exactly what is envisaged is not stated in concrete terms. It may be naive to expect the provisions of a law to be considerate but, at the least, I would like it to explicitly mention the raison d’être of the Centres to Support Ongoing Life in the Community.

2. Why the Life is Hard Network?

The start of the Life is Hard Network and the enforcement of the Act for the Prevention of Recidivism both took place in 2016, but I think that they understood the prevention of repeat offences in different ways. The government’s promotion of the “prevention of recidivism” was positioned as an important measure in contributing to bringing about a society in which people could live safely and with peace of mind, and made this a major goal, while our goal was not preventing repeat offences in and of itself. Facing what made life hard for those people who repeatedly committed offences and gaining an accurate understanding of what made up this context was our goal. Poverty, disability, the bullying or abuse which arise from these, discrimination, and isolation from society – these factors repeatedly overlap, intertwine, and create difficulties in life which are too great to be overcome by self-help. Of course, putting in place the environment necessary for living, such as housing and work, is an absolute necessity. However, what is even more necessary is to build up the interpersonal relationships which have been lost. In building these relationships, the person in question and the supporter must be on an equal footing. As a result, when people who have had difficulties in life for many years and have even experienced life in prison gain new interpersonal relationships which outweigh this past and a “place to live” which, while modest, they do not want to give up, the determination not to commit any more crimes arises spontaneously. We thought that this had to be the goal.

However, the reality was not easy. I was director of the Tokyo Centre to Support Ongoing Life in the Community between 2011 and the spring of 2014, but the barrier against which I always ran up was the inability to develop supporters (particularly in the area of disability welfare). Even if I was lucky enough to find an organization which would take people in, most institutions said that they would “do their best, with preventing repeat offences as the goal”. When I gave an explanation like the one above, saying “Sorry, but that’s not what it’s about”, they gave me questioning looks, and sometimes even lectured me about the importance of supervision. Moreover, when I went to consult with organizations which made clear pronouncements on a daily basis that they “felt it was important to support people who had broken the law”, they almost always politely turned me down. Moreover, it was uncanny how they all gave the following three reasons for refusing, as if they had agreed on their stories beforehand: “Our staff don’t yet have the skills”, “We don’t have experience in supporting people who have come out of prison”, and “What would we do if something happened?” “What would we do?” means “Who would take responsibility?” I always think that these were surely the same words which were once aimed at them by residents who opposed the creation of their facilities, but at the same time, it makes me stop and think. If these pronouncements come from a lack of knowledge of the actual, true situation; if “support” in name only, where the people concerned and their supporters cannot understand one another, continues, it will not generate good results for either party.

Because of this, I approached organizations which had previously worked with us to support disabled people, women’s assistance projects, bar associations, organizations supporting people in need, and so on, saying, “In order to break free from the ‘chain of things making life difficult’, such as disability, poverty, gender, and isolation, supporters must move from being points to lines and from lines to surfaces, and network participants must have a shared understanding of making ‘support for the relationships which humans need in order to live’ the essence of support, and connect this to everyday support.” I set up a general incorporated association, and we began our activities. As I tried things out, I visited correctional institutions, asked the directors of probation facilities for their help, and got together on a regular basis with supporters from different fields, steadily carrying out training and case studies. From 2018 onwards, we were able to receive financial support from the Kirin Foundation, and aimed to expand the content of our work, but in 2020, the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, we lagged behind in our provision of online training, and almost all our activities were put on hold. We restarted our activities in 2021, working hard to provide online courses on a wide range of topics, including child abuse, shut-ins, entry-stage support, decision-making support, sexual abuse, and others. In addition, although long face-to-face meetings are difficult at this time, I am thinking of putting more effort into advice services going forward.

3. What is a society in which we can live safely and with peace of mind?

Looking at the crime statistics from the National Police Agency, the crime rate in Japan peaked in 2002 and has been rapidly falling ever since, reaching ¼ of the peak rate in 2021. In December last year, the Ministry of Justice announced that the “reentry rate” of people committing repeat offences and going back to prison in the two years after their release was 15.7%, achieving the government’s target of lowering this to below 16% by 2021 (endnote). Looking at this result objectively, we can probably say that in numerical terms, the degree of safety in society has increased. However, if we ask whether the same is true of the degree of peace of mind, the answer is “No”. This is because peace of mind is not the property of anyone, but is found within each person’s mind. It continues to waver, and fundamentally cannot be quantified. The minds and hearts of people who find life hard are always wavering.

I think that what is needed by the people which the Life is Hard Network hopes to support is not just “where to live” but, first of all, “who to meet”. If “the people who live in a community are to be supported within that community”, the effort to get to know these people and the power of imagination based on solid evidence are necessary. To what extent are we able to think about why we are facing the person right in front of us? What is important is sharing this with trusted companions, as well as with the person in question. This is particularly important in order to avoid the paternalism and isolation into which supporters often fall.

The reality is that there are people who have been abandoned in the corners of the “society in which we can live safely and with peace of mind” cited in government policies and goals, who face “difficulties in life” far greater than anything that we could imagine.

The Life is Hard Network has steadily continued its trainings, seminars, and other activities over the last five years or so, albeit on a modest scale, but as a network of supporters, I am afraid that the ideal laid out above has not become a reality. This is the reason why my thinking is unchanged, as I wrote in my introduction. It is true that I feel that our circle of influence has widened through our trainings, but when it comes to the strength of those connections, the honest answer is that I am not so confident. I often feel that our strength is negligible, and have a sense of futility. However, if the ideals set forth in the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) are truly possible, our efforts as the Life is Hard Network to search for a way “to leave no-one behind” will continue.

(Note) Achieving the government’s goals (reducing the reentry rate during the two years after release to 16% or lower by 2021, etc.) in order to bring about “Japan, the safest country in the world”, a society in which people can live safely and with peace of mind, was a Cabinet decision of December 2017.

*Editor’s Note: “Many of the supporters who seek to take them in say ‘Let’s make preventing repeat offences the goal’, but whether or not they commit a crime is the result.”

Excerpted from Mamoru Akahira, “Support for people for whom life is hard – escaping from isolation”, pages 9 – 11 of the September 2016 edition of “Normalization – the welfare of disabled people”.