Dn Japanese Voluntary Guardianship System

Aging population and international development of human rights motivate the establishment of voluntary guardianship system in Japan, whose most valuable point is the emphasis on respect for self-determination. The framework of voluntary guardianship system is composed of two parts: one is the voluntary guardianship contract, and the other is superintendence of public power given by the voluntary guardian superintendent appointed by Family Court. This system, adopting some human rights ideas such as "respect for the right of self-determination","normalization","practical use of remaining abilities", etc., tries to strike a balance between maximum exercise of self-determination right and minimum public power interference. The thesis studies Japanese voluntary guardianship system from the aspects of background and process of its establishment, content, present situation of enforcement and existing problems, and points out its inspiration for the legislation in China.The thesis is subdivided into four parts:The first part, background and process of the establishment of Japanese voluntary guardianship system, introduces the aging population issue in Japan and the development of human rights ideas in the international society; then reviews the establishing process of voluntary guardianship system and analyses its legislative pattern as well as influence.The second part, major content of Japanese voluntary guardianship system, starts with the statement of voluntary guardianship definition and its differences from statuary guardianship, which is followed by the analysis on types, parties concerned, content and effect of voluntary guardianship contract. At end of this part, necessary procedures in the application of voluntary guardianship system are introduced.The third part, present situation of the enforcement of voluntary guardianship system and existing problems, analyses the enforcement of this system in Japan by means of statistics and charts, and then comments on several problems arose during the decades of its enforcement. Inspiration from Japanese voluntary guardianship system is discussed in the fourth part. At present China is facing the challenge of an aging society, however, the current adult guardianship system in China falls far behind social development. This part briefly states the experiences that China can draw on from the Japanese voluntary guardianship system and that can be applied for China’s future adult guardianship legislation.