한국사회법학회

Social welfare facilities offer physical spaces for daily living for hundreds of thousands people, but raise doubts whether they fulfill the requirements under the Constitution and international human rights laws to guarantee freedom of residence and adequate housing. The Social Welfare Services Act defines social welfare facilities as a form of business facility, and the relevant social service laws for, among others, people with disabilities fail to provide personal spaces for the users of the facilities. In the absence of privacy, social welfare facilities in effect force people who are in economically and socially vulnerable situations to choose between the right to survive and the right of personality. Such condition is unjust, and social welfare facilities, this article argues, cannot be justified as a form of housing benefits when they fail to meet the legal standards of home/housing under the Constitution and international human rights laws. The current laws on social welfare services are fundamentally flawed as a tool to guarantee the basic human rights to home/housing, and should be restructured based on the new paradigm to ensure the rights of everyone to secure a space of one’s own and to exercise the choice and control for their independent living.