Abused children find little shelter as Japan lags behind

They are administered by child guidance centers that are part of the local prefectural and municipal governments, and have gone largely unsupervised by the central government. They are funded with local and central government money.

Despite its child-friendly image, Japan lags other advanced economies when it comes to protecting the rights of its youth in official care. A fundamental problem is a dearth of foster parents, which means a greater percentage of kids end up in some kind of group care facility than in other developed countries.

Defenders of the system say tight discipline is needed as the children come from a wide range of backgrounds and needs, and without firm control chaos would reign.

“It’s communal living so we do have to set some rules,” said Chikako Yoshikawa, who oversees a shelter in Tokyo. “With a limited number of workers caring for lots of children, a certain level of control is inevitable to prevent accidents.”

However, Doctor Makiko Okuyama, head of psychosocial medicine at the National Center for Child Health and Development, said the shelter experience can verge on traumatic for many children. One teenage girl told her that acts of self-injury, common among sexual abuse victims, invited punishment, not counsel or treatment, from workers.

“We need to think about whether these shelters should continue to exist as they are,” she said. “It’s not a normal place. It’s not a place where anyone should stay for more than a few days.”