Incarceration
Hastily built on existing sites such as race tracks and fair grounds, the temporary Wartime Civil Control Administration (WCCA) detention camps in which the Nikkei were first incarcerated were unfit for human habitation. Given the economic devastation wreaked by the removal, the need for financial and other types of aid soon became obvious, but no system of aid had been established at the centers. The more permanent War Relocation Authority camps to which the Nikkei were then transferred were no better in facilities or services. Social work departments in camps were ill-planned, underfunded, poorly staffed, and inconsistently administered. Recruiting trained social workers to staff the remote and inclement camps was a constant problem. The complicated and conflicted role of the Nikkei workers who comprised the bulk of the social work staff should be understood in the context of the generally fraught dynamic that existed between the Nikkei inmates and the Caucasian staff.