Doctoral Dissertation Research: Transitioning Out of Homelessness in Two Global Cities-- Los Angeles and Tokyo

在过去二十年中，世界主要经济体城市地区出现了大量无家可归人口，引起了相当大的公众关注、政策辩论和社会科学研究。 尽管有证据表明，大多数无家可归的人逃离了这种状况，但过渡过程在很大程度上没有得到充分研究，有利于探索人们如何失去住房并适应他们的困境。 这项研究提案旨在填补现有研究的空白，解释为什么无家可归是作为一个单一的时间危机，间歇性或慢性疾病的差异。 世界各地许多主要城市地区大规模无家可归现象的增加，使人们注意到与全球化有关的趋势，如经济结构调整、收入两极化、移民和社会安全网保护方面的公共开支减少。 拟议的研究将借鉴和促进这一研究领域的见解，审查全球化进程如何通过国家和地方背景进行过滤，以塑造个人努力，在两个“全球城市”-洛杉矶和东京-摆脱无家可归状况。 该项目将使用定性研究策略的组合，涉及在两个城市收集和分析三个数据集：1）个人轨迹数据集，由10个月内对15名无家可归者过渡性住房方案参与者的纵向访谈组成; 2）机构数据集，由参与者在方案设置中的实地观察和对工作人员的访谈组成; 3）关于国家和地方劳动力和住房市场的出版物和统计数据集，无家可归者和居住人口的人口统计数据，与无家可归有关的公共政策，以及公众对无家可归的态度。 定性比较分析（QCA）将适用于“个人轨迹”的数据集，以辨别国家，地方和机构规模的结构性障碍联合收割机，并与个人和机构规模的战略，以产生各种结果的努力，以逃避无家可归。 归纳分析的“个人轨迹”和“机构”的数据集将被用来阐明过渡过程的核心组成部分的性质，如过渡计划的工作人员和参与者之间的关系的作用。 最后，对次级研究数据集的分析将被用来将QCA和归纳分析中揭示的差异归因于与全球化相关的进程通过美国/洛杉矶和日本/东京的国家和地方背景过滤的方式。 这项研究的广泛影响包括以下几点。 研究成果将纳入社会分层、全球化、社会学研究方法等课程的本科生教学，以及研究生研究员教授的其他课程。 大部分数据将在为无家可归者提供服务的过渡性住房项目中收集，从而在研究人员、项目工作人员和客户之间就如何将无家可归作为一个社会问题加以解决展开对话。 除了通过社会学和多学科学术期刊和会议传播研究成果外，还将向地方和国家政策机构以及与无家可归问题有关的社区组织主办的公共座谈会介绍研究成果。 调查结果将在美国和日本（日语）的这些网点中展示，允许国际，跨学科和跨机构交流有关如何帮助试图逃离无家可归的个人的想法。

Over the past two decades, the emergence of sizeable homeless populations in urban areas throughout the world's leading economies has roused considerable public concern, policy debate, and social science research. Despite evidence that most persons who experience homelessness escape the condition, the process of transitioning out has been largely understudied, in favor of exploring how persons lose their housing and adapt to their predicament. This research proposal aims to fill gaps in existing research by developing explanations of why homelessness is experienced differentially as a single time crisis, episodically, or a chronic condition. The rise of mass homelessness in many major urban areas throughout the world has drawn attention beyond local and national scales towards trends associated with globalization such as economic restructuring, income polarization, immigration, and decreased public spending on social safety net protections. The proposed research will draw on and contribute to the insights of this line of research by examining how processes of globalization are filtered through national and local contexts to shape individual efforts to transition out of homelessness in two "global cities"-Los Angeles and Tokyo. The project will use a combination of qualitative research strategies involving collection and analysis of three data sets in both cities: 1) an individual trajectories data set composed of longitudinal interviews over a period of 10 months with 15 participants in transitional housing programs for the homeless; 2) an institutional data set consisting of field notes from participant observation in program settings and interviews with staff; 3) a data set of publications and statistics on national and local labor and housing markets, demographics of homeless and housed populations, public policy relating to homelessness, and public attitudes towards homelessness. Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) will be applied to the "individual trajectories" data set to discern how national, local, and institutional scale structural barriers combine and interact with individual and institutional scale strategies to produce various outcomes of efforts to escape homelessness. Inductive analysis of the "individual trajectories" and "institutional" data sets will be used to elucidate the nature of core components of the transitional process such as the role of relationships between transitional program staff and participants. Lastly, analysis of the secondary research data set will be used to attribute differences revealed in QCA and inductive analyses to the ways in which process associated with globalization are filtered through the national and local contexts of the United States/Los Angeles and Japan/Tokyo. The broader impacts of this research include the following. Research findings will be integrated into instruction of undergraduate students in courses on social stratification, globalization, sociological research methods, and other courses to be taught by the graduate student researcher. The majority of the data will be collected at transitional housing programs serving the homeless, creating a dialogue between researchers, program staff, and clients about how to address homelessness as a social problem. In addition to disseminating results through sociological and multidisciplinary academic journals and conferences, research findings will be presented to local and national policy bodies as well as at public colloquia sponsored by community based organizations concerned with homelessness. Findings will be presented in these outlets in both the U.S. and Japan (in Japanese), allowing for an international, cross-disciplinary, and cross-institutional exchange of ideas about how to aid individuals attempting to escape homelessness.