POLICY PRESSPOLICY & PRACT ICE ROMANI COMMUNITIES AND TRANSFORMATIVE CHANGE A New Social Europe EDITED BY ANDREW RYDER, MARIUS TABA AND NIDHI TREHAN EDITED BY ANDREW RYDER, MARIUS TABA AND NIDHI TREHAN ROMANI COMMUNITIES AND TRANSFORMATIVE CHANGE A New Social Europe POLICY PRESSPOLICY & PRACT ICE First published in Great Britain in 2021 by Policy Press, an imprint of Bristol University Press University of Bristol 1– 9 Old Park Hill Bristol BS2 8BB UK t: +44 (0)117 954 5940 e: bup- [email protected] Details of international sales and distribution partners are available at policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk © Bristol University Press 2021 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978- 1- 4473- 5750- 6 paperback ISBN 978- 1- 4473- 5751- 3 ePub ISBN 978- 1- 4473- 5752- 0 OA ePdf The digital PDF version of this title is available Open Access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0) which permits reproduction and distribution for non-commercial use without further permission provided the original work is attributed. The right of Andrew Ryder, Marius Taba and Nidhi Trehan to be identified as editors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of Bristol University Press. Every reasonable effort has been made to obtain permission to reproduce copyrighted material. If, however, anyone knows of an oversight, please contact the publisher. The statements and opinions contained within this publication are solely those of the editors and contributors and not of the University of Bristol or Bristol University Press. The University of Bristol and Bristol University Press disclaim responsibility for any injury to persons or property resulting from any material published in this publication. Bristol University Press and Policy Press work to counter discrimination on grounds of gender, race, disability, age and sexuality. Cover design: Policy Press Front cover image: Johanne Ryder / Romedia Foundation Hungary Bristol University Press and Policy Press use environmentally responsible print partners. Printed and bound in Great Britain by CMP, Poole I am a Sinto, the son of a Holocaust survivor who lost six aunts and uncles in the Holocaust. I know how racism feels and I don’t want anyone to endure what my people and I have to endure on a daily basis … We not only have COVID- 19 in Europe, but a pandemic that is older and even more dangerous – RACISM! Are we finally prepared to confront this reality and correct this injustice? Romeo Franz, Member of European Parliament, Greens/ EFA, speech before the European Parliament in favour of a new and more robust EU Romani policy, Brussels, 9 July 2020 A great icy mountain, an iceberg, Is standing in front of me, It’s made out of arrogant lords … All of them speak of something. All of them know something. All of them one to another Are telling foolish stories about the Roma … Stop it, gentleman! Do you all want the truth? If you want, I’ll show you Real Gypsydom (Romanipen) The Roma, gentlemen Are a people, just a people … Extract from Iceberg, a poem written in 1976 by Leksa Manush (Aleksandr Belugin), a Latvian Romani poet Contents List of abbreviations vii Notes on contributors ix Acknowledgements xiv Foreword by James K. Galbraith xv one Introduction: Romani communities in a New Social Europe 1 Andrew Ryder, Marius Taba and Nidhi Trehan two Mechanisms of empowerment for the Roma in a New Social Europe 33 Roland Ferkovics, Andrew Ryder and Marek Szilvasi three Antigypsyism in a time of neoliberalism: challenging the radical 65 right through transformative change Marius Taba four Antigypsyism in Hungary: the Gyöngyöspata case versus ‘the 93 people’s sense of justice’ Bernard Rorke five The Romani movement: a love and vocation – Jeno˝ Setét’s 105 reflections on a life of activism Interviewed and translated by Katalin Rostas six Romani young people’s activism and transformative change 115 Anna Daróczi, Lisa Smith and Sarah Cemlyn seven Transatlantic dialogues and the solidarity of the oppressed: critical 145 race activism in the US and Canada Nidhi Trehan and Margareta Matache V ROMANI COMMUNITIES AND TRANSFORMATIVE CHANGE eight ‘When they enter, we all enter …’: envisioning a New Social Europe 179 from a Romani feminist perspective Angéla Kóczé and Nidhi Trehan Afterword: solidarity and equity in a New Social Europe 193 Romeo Franz Index 199 VI List of abbreviations BLM Black Lives Matter CEU Central European University CoE Council of Europe CSCE Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe EC European Commission ERIAC European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture ERRC European Roma Rights Centre EU European Union FRA Fundamental Rights Agency GRT Gypsies, Roma and Travellers IRU International Romani Union LGBTQ lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and queer LIBE Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs NGO non-governmental organization NRIS National Roma Integration Strategies OSCE Office of Security and Cooperation in Europe OSF Open Society Foundation RC Romani CRISS REF Roma Education Fund UN United Nations VII Notes on contributors Sarah Cemlyn, a Fellow of Corvinus University Budapest, is a long- time social practitioner, researcher and activist with Gypsies, Travellers and Roma, focusing on human rights, equality and empowerment. She undertook the first English- wide survey of social service responses to Gypsies and Travellers, led the 2009 Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) report into inequalities they experience, and participated in accommodation, education and broader policy research studies. Recently, she worked with European and British Romani women activists to analyse Romani women’s and young people’s activism. Anna Daróczi holds a BA in Social Education and an MA in Gender Studies from the Central European University (CEU). She is an expert in Romani youth issues and gender equality, and worked at the Tom Lantos Institute, Hungary, managing its Romani rights and citizenship programme for two years. She has been coordinating the Voluntary Service Programme of the Phiren Amenca International Network since September 2016, where she works to empower Romani young people in civic and political participation. Roland Ferkovics is a political scientist, researcher and advocate who focuses his professional attention on the political representation of Roma and their educational and employment IX ROMANI COMMUNITIES AND TRANSFORMATIVE CHANGE inclusion in European countries. He holds an MA degree from the Department of Political Science of the CEU and a BA degree from the Department of Political Science of the University of Szeged. He currently works at the Roma Education Fund (REF) as Policy and Advocacy Officer, and, in the past, has been employed by Columbia University, CEU, Penn State University, the German Marshall Fund of the US and Morgan Stanley. Romeo Franz is an EU lawmaker for the Group of the Greens/ European Free Alliance. As a Member of European Parliament from Germany, he serves as Vice Chair of the Culture and Education Committee and is a substitute member on both the Employment and Social Affairs and the Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs Committees. James K. Galbraith holds the Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr. Chair in Government/ Business Relations at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs and is Professor of Government at the University of Texas at Austin. Angéla Kóczé is an assistant professor, Acting Chair of Romani Studies and Academic Director of the Roma Graduate Preparation Programme at CEU in Budapest, Hungary. During 2013– 17, she was a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Sociology and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program at Wake Forest University in Winston Salem, NC, USA. She has published several peer-reviewed articles and book chapters with various international publishers, including Palgrave Macmillan, Ashgate, Routledge and CEU Press, as well as thematic policy papers related to social inclusion, gender equality, social justice and civil society. Margareta (Magda) Matache is a justice activist and scholar from Romania, Director of the Roma Program at the FXB (François- Xavier Bagnoud) Center for Health X Notes ON contributors and Human Rights, and instructor at Harvard University. In 2012, she was awarded a Hauser Postdoctoral Fellowship at the FXB Center, where she founded the university’s first and only Roma Program. From 2005 to 2012, Dr Matache was the Executive Director of the Roma Centre for Social Intervention and Studies (Romani CRISS), a Roma rights organization. In 2017, she co- edited Realizing Roma Rights (with J. Bhabha and A. Mirga), an investigation of anti-Romani racism in Europe. Dr Matache is also the co-editor (along with J. Bhabha, C. Elkins and W. Johnson) of Time for Reparations: Addressing State Responsibility for Collective Injustice (University of Pennsylvania Press, forthcoming 2020). Bernard Rorke is an Advocacy and Policy Manager for the European Roma Rights Centre (ERRC). He has worked on the rights of Roma for over two decades, and was previously Director of Roma Initiatives with the Open Society Foundation. He has a PhD in Political Theory from the Centre for the Study of Democracy, University of Westminster, UK. He is editor of ERRC News, Budapest correspondent for Hope not Hate and is a regular contributor on Romani issues. Katalin Rostas holds a BA from the Corvinus University Budapest. She recently graduated from the Roma Access Programme of the CEU and is now a postgraduate student at the CEU in Vienna. Katalin is an activist for the rights of Roma and has worked for the Roma Education Fund as a mentor.