The Role that Blind Groups Played in the Enactment for the Act on Welfare of Physically Disabled Persons

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  • KONISHI Ritsuko
    関西学院大学大学院人間福祉研究科博士課程後期課程

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  • 身体障害者福祉法成立に盲人集団が果たした役割
  • シンタイ ショウガイシャ フクシホウ セイリツ ニ モウジン シュウダン ガ ハタシタ ヤクワリ

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Abstract

The Act on Welfare of Physically Disabled Persons, enacted in Japan in 1949, was made with the purpose of rescuing disabled veterans, who had been deprived of their privileges by General Headquarters (GHQ) and had fallen into poverty. However, in order for the Japanese government to develop policies covering disabled people (which were put in place to a limited extent) into the Act on Welfare of Physically Disabled Persons in the face of GHQ, whose occupation policy was based on demilitarization and democratization, they needed people who had not been associated with the war. This is where blind groups came into the picture. Feeling the risk of losing vocational independence, since the pre-war period, blind groups had engaged in a campaign for the enactment of the Act, a practice of Japanese-style social work and vocational rehabilitation, and had formed a national organization. In the postwar period, they invited Helen Keller and established the Japan Federation of the Blind as a coordinating body. Through the Helen Keller campaign, the blind groups urged the realization of the Act on Social Welfare Service for the Blind. Placing blind groups at the center of measures for disabled people, the Japanese government and GHQ orchestrated a campaign and proceeded to realize the Act on Welfare of Physically Disabled Persons.

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