June 7, 2016

The year 1995 is often recalled as the "First Year of Volunteering" in Japan. It was named as such because, when the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake occurred in 1995, more than 1 million people from all corners of Japan spontaneously rushed to the affected areas and assisted people who had hitherto been strangers to them. This significantly extended the notion of volunteerism beyond mutual help, which had been a common form of social support within local communities.

The event was really epoch making in Japanese society. But it should be noted that Japanese people had actually started volunteering 30 years before the Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake outside Japan - in developing countries - through the Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers (JOCV) program. In its inception, the program was open to youths only, but then expanded to include seniors under 69 as well as volunteers who work for Nikkei communities in the Americas.　To date, more than 49,000 people have served in these types of volunteering, including 2,500 currently working in some 80 countries around the world.

Among these different types, the mainstay is the original youth volunteer program, comprising the majority of volunteers. The program started in 1965 with three objectives: contributing to the development of host countries, promoting friendship between Japan and host countries and equipping Japanese youths with global vision. The US Peace Corps, established in 1961 under the leadership of President Kennedy, was one of the triggers for creating the Japanese version of youth volunteer program.

In present days, young volunteers are serving in a variety of fields, including education, health, sports, agriculture and social welfare. The skills of individual volunteers (such as nursing, volley ball coaching, etc.) are as many as 100. Having a strong desire to help developing countries and applying to the program at his/her own initiative is an essential prerequisite to be a volunteer. At the same time applicants are required to have some skills that can respond to the needs of host countries.

In host countries, volunteers work in schools, hospitals, city halls, local NGOs and other organizations with local bosses and colleagues. The usual challenges they face in the first days of their services are the different customs and practices from those in Japan; such as discipline in workplace, sense of punctuality and　quality of facilities and equipment. These challenges make them seriously think about what they can do in the given conditions and how they can motivate their colleagues. In the course of this struggle, volunteers gradually find their own way and learn to make a change with creativity. One example is producing teaching aid with locally available inexpensive materials. Their private life also becomes localized as they get familiar with local cuisine and dress in local costumes.

It would not be realistic to expect these volunteers to perform miracles such as solving all problems in their workplace in two years of assignment. Nevertheless, the very presence of Japanese volunteers brings stimulus and positive impacts on their colleagues, students and local communities. Likewise, the volunteers, for their part, learn a lot from interacting with their counterparts, whom they are designed to help. Through this mutual exchange, people-to-people friendship and understanding are promoted. It is particularly so in Asian countries such as the Philippines and China where the general sentiment towards Japan was not positive after World War II. The local people, through their contacts with the volunteers, came to feel that "these young Japanese are different from the Japanese I had known." The role that the volunteers have played in promoting reconciliation at grass-root level should not go unnoticed.

Through these experiences, many young volunteers came home to Japan grown up and more mature upon finishing their tour. However, the reception accorded to them by the Japanese society upon their return was not necessarily positive in the past. Under the lifetime employment system, preserving harmony in workplace was the priority in many Japanese companies. The returnee volunteers were often regarded as being too independent and not team players. However, there have been drastic changes in the situation in recent years as Japanese businesses strive to cope with globalization. Companies now need employees who have the potential to work in globalized business environments. Thus the demand for ex-volunteers in the job market is becoming high.

In addition to the role in global businesses, the talent of ex-volunteers is attracting attention inside Japan as well. Hundreds of ex-volunteers have worked for the revitalization of rural cities and towns as well as reconstruction from the Great East Japan Earthquake. Ex-volunteers are working in rural communities as helpers from outside to find solutions to a host of problems while overcoming such constraints as the lack of financial resources, population decrease and inconvenient transportation. In doing so, they are seeking ways for motivating and mobilizing the local community members. This is exactly what they learned from the experience of volunteering in developing countries.

In the face of continued low birth rate in Japan, overseas volunteer programs might find it more difficult to recruit young people as they compete in the Japanese job market for scarce young human resources.

However, insofar as the volunteering experiences in developing countries can bring added value to Japanese companies and local communities, volunteering should be regarded as an important step of fostering valuable young talents.

(The writer is Vice President of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA))

2016年 6月 7日

阪神・淡路大震災が発生した1995年は、日本の「ボランティア元年」とも言われている。それまでの日本で一般的だった地域社会の中での相互扶助から踏み出し、個人の意思で見ず知らずの被災者を支援しようと、全国から駆けつけた人々が100万人を超えたというのが、この名称の意味だという。

しかし、これに先立つこと30年、開発途上国向けの海外ボランティア活動は既に開始されていた。青年海外協力隊である。当初は20歳から39歳までの青年が参加するものだったが、その後40歳以上のシニア海外ボランティア、更には中南米の日系社会への青年ボランティアやシニアボランティアへと拡大していった。現在は年間約2,500名のボランティアが世界の約80ヶ国で活動しており、50年間の参加者総数は49,000名を超える。

これら各種ボランティアの中で中心的な位置を占める青年海外協力隊は、発展途上国の開発への協力、派遣国との友好親善の促進、日本の青少年の国際的視野の涵養という３つの目的をもつ事業として1965年に開始された。その背景には、ケネディ大統領の提唱で発足したアメリカの平和部隊の影響もあったと言われている。

現在派遣中の協力隊員の活動分野は教育、保健、スポーツ、農業、社会福祉などであり、具体的な職種（看護師、バレーボールなど）は約100と多岐にわたる。ボランティア事業であるので、隊員は、「開発途上国のために役に立ちたい」という意思を持ち、自発的に応募した希望者から選ばれる。但し、各国からの派遣要請に応えることができるスキルを持っていることが前提となる。

派遣国に到着後は、学校、病院、市役所、現地NGO組織などの職場に所属し、現地の人々を上司や同僚として活動する。当初多くの隊員は、日本との違い―職場の規律、時間の感覚、施設や設備の不足等―に戸惑い、自分に何ができるのか、どうすれば相手を動かすことができるのか真剣に悩む。その過程で、次第に自分なりのやり方を見つけ、現地で安価に入手できる材料で教材を作るなどの創意工夫も生まれる。現地の食事にも慣れ、民族衣装を好んで着るなど、私生活の現地化も進む。

成果という点では、2年間という限られた期間であるので、配属された職場が抱える問題を一挙に解決するような大きなものは望めないが、隊員の存在は同僚や関係者（教え子やコミュニティの人々）に刺激を与えている。隊員も、助けるつもりであった現地の人々から逆に多くを学ぶ。その過程を通じて国民間の相互理解が深まっていく。特に第二次世界大戦後、対日感情が良好とは言えなかったフィリピンや中国などアジアの国々で、「自分が思っていた日本人と、この若者は違う」と思わせた隊員達の存在は、それらの国との和解の促進に草の根レベルで貢献したと言えるだろう。

こうした経験を通じて多くの青年海外協力隊員は一回り成長して帰国するが、彼等にとって以前の日本社会は暖かいものではなかった。終身雇用制の下で職場の和を重んずる日本の企業文化の中では、協力隊経験者は、独立心が強過ぎる、協調性がないなどと敬遠されていたことが理由の一つである。しかし最近、状況は大きく変わってきている。グローバル化への対応が焦眉の急となる中で、帰国隊員はグローバル人材の資質があるとして企業にも歓迎されるようになっている。

隊員経験者の活躍の場はグローバル・ビジネスにとどまらない。日本国内でもその役割が注目されている。とりわけ、地域興しや東日本大震災後の復興の場では、多くの隊員経験者が活躍している。彼らは、外部者として市町村や地域社会に入り、資金がない、過疎化が進む、交通が不便等の制約の中で、地域の人々とともに解決策を探りながら、地域の人々の力を引き出す努力をしている。こうしたことは、まさに彼らが協力隊活動を通して学んだことだ。

少子化が進む日本社会では、国内での若手人材の確保と、海外でのボランティア活動への参加者確保が競合関係となることも予想される。しかし、ボランティア活動の経験が企業や地域社会に付加価値をもたらすのであれば、有為な青年を育成する重要な機会ととらえることができるのではないだろうか。

(筆者は国際協力機構理事）