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

在过去的二十年里，世界主要经济体城市地区出现了大量无家可归者，这引起了公众的关注、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脱了这种状况，但人们对无家可归的过渡过程的研究在很大程度上还不够充分，人们更倾向于探索人们是如何失去住房并适应困境的。这项研究计划的目的是填补现有研究的空白，通过发展解释为什么无家可归的经历是不同的，作为一个单一的时间危机，偶然的，或慢性疾病。在世界各地许多主要城市地区，大规模无家可归者的增加引起了地方和国家层面以外的关注，使人们注意到与全球化有关的趋势，如经济结构调整、收入两极分化、移民和社会安全网保护方面的公共支出减少。拟议的研究将通过研究全球化进程如何通过国家和地方背景过滤，塑造两个“全球城市”（洛杉矶和东京）的个人努力，以摆脱无家可归，从而借鉴并促进这一研究路线的见解。该项目将结合定性研究策略，收集和分析两个城市的三个数据集：1)个人轨迹数据集，由15名无家可归者过渡性住房项目参与者在10个月的时间里的纵向访谈组成；2)机构数据集，包括参与者在项目设置中观察到的现场笔记和对工作人员的采访；3)关于国家和地方劳动力和住房市场、无家可归者和住房人口的人口统计、与无家可归者有关的公共政策以及公众对无家可归者的态度的出版物和统计数据集。定性比较分析（QCA）将应用于“个人轨迹”数据集，以辨别国家、地方和机构规模的结构性障碍如何与个人和机构规模的战略相结合和相互作用，从而产生各种努力摆脱无家可归的结果。对“个人轨迹”和“机构”数据集的归纳分析将用于阐明过渡过程核心组成部分的性质，例如过渡方案工作人员与参与者之间关系的作用。最后，对二级研究数据集的分析将用于将QCA和归纳分析中揭示的差异归因于与全球化相关的过程通过美国/洛杉矶和日本/东京的国家和地方背景过滤的方式。本研究的广泛影响包括以下几点。研究成果将纳入本科生的社会分层、全球化、社会学研究方法等课程的教学，以及研究生研究员讲授的其他课程。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，在研究人员、项目工作人员和客户之间建立一个关于如何解决无家可归这个社会问题的对话。除了通过社会学和多学科学术期刊和会议传播研究结果外，研究结果还将提交给地方和国家政策机构以及由关心无家可归问题的社区组织主办的公开讨论会。调查结果将在美国和日本的这些网点（日语）中呈现，允许就如何帮助试图摆脱无家可归的个人进行国际，跨学科和跨机构的思想交流。

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.