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Street Life, Value and Exchange in a Poor Neighborhood of Bucharest

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Street Life, Value and Exchange in a Poor Neighborhood of Bucharest STREET LIFE, VALUE AND EXCHANGE IN A POOR NEIGHBORHOOD OF BUCHAREST by Gergő Pulay Submitted to Central European University Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Supervisors: Dr. Vlad Naumescu Dr. Violetta Zentai Budapest, Hungary 2017 1 Abstract In states of postsocialist Eastern Europe, the search for local obstacles to the civilizing process took the shape of exposing society’s ‘dirty laundry’ – as a public disciplinary exercise by politicians, the media, as well as by ordinary citizens – and has been conducive to the stigmatization of abject populations. The marginalized and mixed Roma and non-Roma Romanian neighbourhood of Bucharest that provides the field-site of this ethnographic account is known as an ultimate ‘Gypsyland’ (ţiganie) in town, an ‘internal orient’ containing the ‘worthless’ and ‘uncivilized’ of urban society. The dissertation advances the conceptual framework of stigmatization by connecting the urban scale of inquiry to the marginalization that occurs at the level of the EU superpolity, as it details how the historically developed urban inequalities in Bucharest work in tandem with unequal relations between the states of Western Europe and the post-socialist European periphery. The different scales of stigma coalesce when the inhabitants of the ‘Gypsy’ neighbourhood – and by extension Romanian Gypsies in general – are accused of giving ‘a bad name’ to the Romanian nation. In this context, poor neighbourhoods can obtain highly central positions not only as regular suppliers of ’hot issues’ in the public, but also because of the metonymic power by which they allude to the overall plight of the city and the nation at the European periphery. Following the tradition of urban ethnographies, the dissertation focuses on the links between marginality and the livelihood strategies with which inhabitants of the neighbourhood– especially men who regularly hang out and make deals in the street – strive to create material and non-material value in their uncertain environments as a form of place-making. A recent wave of scholarly accounts relies on the notion of precariousness in order to account for the rising uncertainties of work and employment in various domains, especially in the aftermath of the financial crisis. As this dissertation argues, such assumptions would lead us to misunderstandings when it comes to the categories of practice by which marginalized people make sense of the social and economic contexts in which they act, as well as their regimes of accumulating personal worth and material value through production and circulation,or trade and exchange which are all constitutive to their notions of personhood. 2 Statement I hereby state that this dissertation contains no materials accepted for any other degrees in any other institutions. The dissertation also does not contain any materials previously written or published by another person, except where appropriate acknowledgement is made in the form of bibliographical reference. Gergő Pulay, Budapest, 30th of September 2017. 3 Acknowledgements This dissertation is the outcome of a prolonged period of research both in the sense of ethnographic fieldwork and as a quest for the meaning of life. First and foremost, I express my gratitude to the inhabitants of the Ferentari neighbourhood in Bucharest whom I got to know during my fieldwork, and especially to the Spoitori Gypsies, with whom I had the closest relationship in the neighbourhood, and who perfectly understood my situation as a doctoral student on fieldwork. A full list of persons who made contributions to my efforts (together with the necessary comments) would be perhaps as long as one of the Chapters. Therefore I limit the list of friend and colleagues here especially to those who were present somehow and who supported me during the very difficult period of writing-up, my return to the academic scene – to CEU especially – and who helped me to maintain the belief that I have something meaningful to say: Marian-Viorel Anăstăsoaie, Natalia Buier, Ana Chiriţoiu, Călin Cotoi, Pinar Donmez, Răzvan Dumitru, Judit Durst, Margit Feischmidt, Martin Fotta, László Fosztó, Ágnes Gagyi, Ştefan Guga, Attila Hegedűs, Jan Grill, Mariya Ivancheva, Cecilia Kovai, Stefan Krastev, Péter Nagy, Vlad Naumescu, Attila Melegh, Florin Poenaru, Prem Kumar Rajaram, Tom Slater, Michael Stewart, Cătălina Tesar, Radu Umbreş, Violetta Zentai, and my parents and family. I’m also grateful to all the participants of the debates on my Chapters, including those who attended the workshops held in 2016 at the Institute for Minority Studies (Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Centre for Social Sciences). 4 Table of Contents Abstract ..................................................................................................................................................... 2 Statement .................................................................................................................................................. 3 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................................... 4 Table of Contents ...................................................................................................................................... 5 Introduction: The poverty of poverty research ........................................................................................ 7 Fieldwork encounters ............................................................................................................................ 7 We are Ferentarists! ............................................................................................................................ 10 Street, household and value................................................................................................................ 26 The main concepts of the dissertation ................................................................................................ 31 Towards an urban ethnography of marginality in Bucharest .............................................................. 37 Outline of the dissertation .................................................................................................................. 43 Chapter 1. Crisis, stigma and resemblance ............................................................................................. 47 Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 47 In a castle under siege ......................................................................................................................... 49 What Madonna said ............................................................................................................................ 57 Scales, fear and intimacy ..................................................................................................................... 65 Romanians and Gypsies: civilization and its discontents .................................................................... 73 Conclusions .......................................................................................................................................... 76 Chapter 2. A history of urban marginality in Bucharest .......................................................................... 80 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 80 The metonymic mahala and the urban margins in a “city of contrasts” ............................................ 83 The relegations of the dispossessed ................................................................................................... 92 “It was a field” ..................................................................................................................................... 97 Conclusions ........................................................................................................................................ 101 Chapter 3. The Civilized, the Vagabond, the Player and the Fool ......................................................... 106 Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 106 5 Texas, Bronx, Romania ...................................................................................................................... 107 Being civilized .................................................................................................................................... 117 Being a player .................................................................................................................................... 125 Conclusions ........................................................................................................................................ 134 Chapter 4. ‘I’m good but also mad’: The street economy in a poor Neighbourhood of Bucharest ...... 137 Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 137 The neighbourhood with the greatest traffic .................................................................................... 140 Madness and silent armament .........................................................................................................
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