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Even when the timing of co-residence is postponed or delayed to adjust to the new social realities of mobile children, this expectation about what security "ought" to be is still critical for the Japanese vision of old age. Social support therefore centers around filial ties, focused narrowly on one child, especially the co-resident child, and underlying this behavior is the notion that dependency on adult children in old age is legitimate and inevitable. Compared with their American counterparts, the Japanese elderly do not rely nearly as much on their spouse, friends, neighbors, and relatives as they do on their adult children for all types of help. The Japanese support system is not as diversified as in American society where the spouse constitutes the primary tie, friends are indispensable for companionship and sharing confidences, and neighbors and relatives also play an important role in support arrangements. If the American support system is designed to minimize dependence on any one source to enhance the independence of the elderly, then the Japanese approach is one in which there is an inevitably heavy dependence on just one source, the co-resident child.
The relative readiness to accept dependence in old age derives from an assumption that everyone must need help in old age. People perceive needing help in old age as neither a probability nor a possibility, but an inescapable, inevitable part of the end of life. So, eventual need is not something that "might" happen, but something that "will" happen to everyone. When need in old age is inevitable, then the elderly themselves are not responsible for this state of being; they can therefore "legitimately" depend on others to look after their needs. This prospective view of need in old age is therefore a key supposition in the Japanese preference for filial ties.
By monitoring the family status of the elderly, social service stipulations and practices in Japan can also presuppose social obligations. Social services are often organized in a way that reinforces the obligations of family members as caregivers. Social services like home health care, lunch services, and nursing care can be targeted to specific types of elderly people who are deemed needy not only because of their disability, but also because they do not have family. The eligibility criteria for services in Japan include family status-sometimes implicitly but often also explicitly- adding to other eligibility criteria like income and disability. Family status, like living alone or only with spouse, but without children, can affect the priorities assigned to some people waiting for a nursing home bed, others seeking subsidized lunch services, or those searching for home health aids and other services.
However, we must recognize that binding families to provide such care through obligation and disempowerment also conversely diminishes the families' capacity to cope with the intensity and volume of needs. This makes a genuine solution to the problems in old age difficult to achieve. The true solution would be to diversify the resources by legitimating all forms of help and assistance from a wide range of sources outside the family. To do this would require a fundamental redefinition of cultural expectations and ideals of old age and family. To realize this vision, Japan must prepare to pay for and build a wide range of facilities and human resources as well.
Ultimately, notions of goodness and deservedness-and the rights and responsibilities in the family-need not hinge so much on social approval as they do on our ability to reconcile our egoism and altruism. In this sense, it is time to contemplate an appropriate redefinition for the "good family" that befits the demands of this new century, without taking its boundless exertion for granted.
Akiko Hashimoto
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