Category Archives: Bulgaria

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23.04.2014 Free movement of workers: access to the labour market remains difficult

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Pastural (2014) reports – on the occasion of the European free movement of workers with Romania and Bulgaria since January 2014 – about possible improvements in the access of Rroma to the French labour market. However, this is not the case. The access to the labour market for the low-skilled Rroma workers remains very difficult: “Full of experience as a result of working in agriculture or construction in Greece and Italy, Ionut Nica waited impatiently for the end of the transitional arrangements, towards the access of Romanian nationals to the labour market of the Schengen area. Since January 2014, Ionut has the right to work. “There was a tremendous hope on the part of Mr. Nica, who expected this splendid date of the month of January as if it would change his whole life”, laments Florence Marrand, social worker at the medical-social establishment of the Conseil général of Puy-de-Dôme, who advises Ionut Nica regularly for a little over one year. “Today, he is deeply disappointed. Certainly, he was able to enrol at the job centre, he could enrol at the work-assistant mission, he was able to answers vacancies. But nothing has changed specifically, absolutely nothing…“ It is to hope that Pastural is wrong with his portrayal of two individual cases, and the inclusion of immigrant Rroma into the labour market will enhance. At the latest, when the effects of the economic crisis are finally gone. One problem is, according to Pastural, the lack of resources to improve ones qualifications, and thus the appeal for the labour market.

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18.04.2014 “Gypsies On Benefits And Proud” confirmes racist stereotypes

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The English television program Gypsies On Benefits And Proud, which reports on migrant Rroma in England, shamelessly confirms racist stereotypes about workshy, asocial Rroma, by unscrupulously abusing the good faith of the interviewees. The populist program aims to show how easy it allegedly is for Romanian and Bulgarian Rroma migrants to travel to England and to abuse the local welfare system. That these are extreme individual cases is deliberately concealed, as well as the fact that the portrayed Rroma lived in poorest conditions and under discrimination in their home villages: “Gipsies have revealed how they are claiming thousands of pounds every month in benefits after moving to Britain and milking the generous state benefit system. The admissions were made in a damning new Channel 5 documentary, which follows the lives of Roma gipsies in Britain. […] The documentary, which will air April 11, also features Ion Lazar, 36, who came to the Britain with five other immigrants when the work restrictions on Romanians were lifted in January. He admits he is just planning to stash his benefits to take home to his family in Romania. ‘I need maybe forty thousand from benefits…. four zero thousand pounds for my family and I think this money I can make in one years maybe two,’ he said.” The program Gypsies on Benefits And Proud deliberately discredits an entire ethnic group with its undifferentiated reporting by establishing a clear link between ethnicity and social abuse. It thus makes itself indictable for racist defamation. Politically loaded views are presented as if they were scientific facts. By this, they also abuse the good faith of television viewers who expect the media to present truth, and encourage fascist views and opinions, as one can read in the comment section of the articles. These fascist comments should provide ample food for thought for the creators of the TV show and the journalists as they reproduce the viewpoints of the program without thinking. They thereby implicitely advocate what is no less than an intellectual genocide of the Rroma (compare Britton 2014, Channel 5 2014, Dassanayake 2014, Lincolnshire Echo 2014, McGarry 2014).

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16.04.2014 Manual Valls has to go back to court

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The new Prime Minister of France, Manuel Valls, must again appear in front of the court. The Rroma organization La Voix des Rroms accuses him of incitement to “discrimination, hatred, and violence” against Rroma. The lawsuit relates to statements that Valls made on the March 14th and on September 24th, 2013 in presence of the French press. He accused Rroma immigrants in France of wilfully not wanting to integrate and stated that there is widespread, intra-ethnic crime amongst them: “The inhabitants of the camps do not want to integrate into our country, for cultural reasons or because they are at the mercy of begging or prostitution networks. […] They have an extremely different lifestyle than we do and are obviously enough on a confrontation course: we all know, the proximity of these camps causes begging and theft and therefore delinquency. […] The Rroma have a tendency to return to Romania and Bulgaria.” Fassin wonders why the lawsuit against Valls has not received any media attention. He explains this lack of interest on the one hand with a focus on his political profile that is characterized by seriousness and rigor, and on the other hand, with the verdict of the French court of December 13th, 2013. This first lawsuit against Valls, filed by the French movement against racism (MRAP), was rejected with the explanation that Valls’ statements were not a minister’s instructions, but personal opinions of the politician: “[the minister] is in the exercise of his function when he is issuing instructions […] but not when he interacts with the media to express his opinion. […] The French Republic does not recognize the concept of race. [He] could only be in the exercise of his functions, if he recommended a different treatment of persons, based on their origin.” Fassin discredits this justification of the French court as absurd. It means that de facto a minister can never possibly speak on behalf of the government in matters relating to racism, but only ever on his own. Thus one allows Manual Valls and other policy makers to enjoy the privilege of fools, while it is denied to the rest of the population, whereby Fassin is absolutely right (Fassin 2014).

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12.03.2014 Talking to each other instead of about each other: German visit in Bulgaria

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Plück (2014) reports about the visit of the German FDP deputies Alexander Graf Lambsdorff and Joachim Stamp in Plovdiv, where 50,000 Rroma are living in mostly precarious conditions. Lambsdorff states that the aim of the visit is to talk with the people concerned and to thereby get rid of the one-sidedness in the debate on Rroma. Unfortunately, there isn’t really anything new to hear in Plück’s article: Bulgaria is said to be an economically weak country that is plagued by severe corruption. Because of nepotism, EU funding programs are very poorly implemented. The Rroma representative Anton Karagyozov meanwhile confirms stereotypical notions of clan structures, widespread crime and misery: “He reported plainly of the financial support for children whose fathers are dead or sitting in jail and whose mothers have left them in Stolipinovo to earn money with prostitution in Western Europe. He reports from the strict clan structures, such that a woman can be “stolen” by a man if she does not want to marry him. In plain language this means rape and a subsequent wedding.” Such stories may be useful for obtaining support funds. But they do not contribute at all to the successful integration of the Rroma. Rather, they nourish the clichéd notions that are mentioned again and again in the debate on “poverty immigrants”. Plück’s article does not change any of these misconceptions.

Merkelt (2014) meanwhile reports on a cultural event in Duisburg. In an old fire station, a Rrom sang “Gypsy Songs” for the visiting Gadje. Author Rolf Bauerdick read from his controversial book, trying to counteract cliché ideas in his own way, even though he inevitably confirms many stereotypes. As he only portrays already visible Rroma in his book, most of which live in economic misery, he does not really confront the public image with new ideas.

Scherfig (2014) complements the theme with a report on the integration project “Harzer Strasse” in Berlin-Neukölln. In 2011, the Aachen housing company bought three mostly inhabited by immigrant Rroma and massively overcrowded apartment buildings, and renovated them. The adult residents almost exclusively work and try to improve their language skills. The housing complex “Harzer Strasse” is considered a showcase project, as it demonstrates the possibility of successful integration, based on promotion and simultaneous demand: “Since the first of January 2014, the free movement of persons is valid for Romania and Bulgaria. [ … ] Critics fear the “immigration into the German social system.” […] However, almost all Roma in the Harzer Strasse have been working for several years and also pay into the social system. […] According to the federal employment agency, Bulgarians and Romanians only make up 0.7 percent of Hartz IV recipients.”

Another aspect of the immigration debate are immigrants from former Yugoslavia. Blasius (2014) reports on the sharp rise in the number of asylum procedures by immigrants from Serbia, Macedonia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, many of them are said to be Rroma. Almost all applications for a permanent residency permit are rejected because the citizens of the former Yugoslavia are not recognised as political refugees: “Despite the often miserable living conditions, Roma are not recognized as political refugees from former Yugoslavia. Unlike Roma from the EU-countries Bulgaria and Romania, they have no permanent right to stay.” In response to this, Blasius states, many of the rejected just file new applications, as they are entitled to under the law. Therewith, the flood of applications can be explained. The German grand coalition meanwhile plans to classify Bosnia, Macedonia and Serbia as safe countries of origin in order to enable accelerated deportations. The classification will be done at the expense of the immigrants who get no voice in the process, but de facto are affected by precarious conditions in their countries of origin. While the proponents of deportations rely on country analyses, which declare no or very minimal discrimination against minorities in countries like Serbia, the proponents of the asylum seekers state the exact opposite. Subjective experiences, which can rarely be proved with documents, are usually neglected in favour of official country analyses that assess the social situation in a country.

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11.04.2014 How non-objective assumptions reinforce racist stereotypes

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Birrer (2014) reports, on the basis of the TV-report “More underage criminal tourists” by Georg Humbel (2014), about the allegedly increasing number of criminal Rroma children. As the article by Gut/Scherrer (2013) in the Weltwoche of November 2013, Birrer cites police sources that speak of transnationally operating child-trafficking networks. The basic existence of such criminal actors is not to deny here, but their characterisation and especially their frequency, has to be strongly questioned. Birrer argues as follows, in reference to the Bernese immigration-policemen Alexander Ott: “They come mainly from Eastern Europe – and don’t pursue their criminal activity voluntarily in Switzerland. In their home countries, they are recruited by traffickers, and finally borrowed from well-organized gangs. Many of them are Roma from Romania and Bulgaria. […] The children are under constant scrutiny of agile backers. They have to expect sanctions, if they do not generate a certain amount of cash and valuables. Therefore, they are helplessly extradited to the traffickers.” The evidence for the existence of such child-trafficker gang is very poor, as many articles to show (compare Friedli/Schöpfer 2013, Mappes-Niediek 2012, Mappes-Niediek 2013, Jirat 2013, Tabin 2012). Rather, they are civil and police morals and assumptions associated with them that make the begging or stealing children automatically victims of brutal traffickers. The fact that behind it, there is mostly great poverty which forces to beg is not considered in this reasoning. Thus gaps in knowledge, about the socio-economic situation in the countries of origin of the children are used in order to present them as part of criminal Rroma gangs. This practice says more about the own prejudices and morals, than it explain something about the Rroma.

Jirat (2013) discusses the project „Agora“, which was founded on the initiative of Alexander Ott in 2009. The aim of this project is to prevent organized child abuse and human trafficking, of which young Rroma are said to be mainly affected. Jirat questions precisely this status of the beggars. The data of the Bernese immigration police – which states a strong presence of beggar gangs in Bern – are of doubtful origin. Jirat states: “The immigration police view is necessarily limited: the focus is always a possible crime (human trafficking or child abuse), and there are always potential perpetrators, which are repeatedly named: “most of them are Roma.” This is the crucial point. “Through this representation, the social construction of a ‘Roma-problem’ in connection with begging is made”, says the historian Bernhard Schär from the Center for Democracy in Aarau. The same is done in connection with break-ins or street prostitution.” The perspective and analysis of the immigration police, Jirat argues, is a strongly biased. It operates with the logic of perpetrators and victims. The sociological perspective is almost totally neglected.

Tabin (2012) proves that a causal relationship between begging children and organized gangs cannot be confirmed by social science. The modest incomes obtained by begging, don’t coincide in any way with the proceeds referred to by the Bernese immigration police, which speaks of up to 600 francs per child. Tabin, who refers to additional, similar studies, comes to an average amount of 15 to 20 francs per day.

In any case, it is very problematic to describe the begging of Rroma children as a cultural phenomenon. Journalists as Mappes-Niediek decidedly write against this notion and see the supposed beggar gangs in reality as a symptom of poverty, that has nothing to do with organized crime: “There are prestige hierarchies in the Roma neighbourhoods, customary clientilism, dependencies, mostly through informal money lending. But structures of command and obedience were not noticed by the numerous social workers, anthropologists or humanitarian aid workers, who work in Roma slums and sometimes live there. [ … ] Wrong is also the impression that human trafficking, crime and begging with children is the rule among the poverty migrants from Bulgaria and Romania. Begging with kids is prohibited all over Europe and basically rarely, because it takes place, by its very nature, in the greatest possible publicness” (Mappes-Niediek 2013).

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11.04.2014 Robert Kushen: the integration of Rroma remains a challenge

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On the occasion of the international Rroma Day, the chairman of the European Rroma Rights Centre, Robert Kushen, reflects on the situation of the Rroma in Europe and the continuing challenges for this minority (Kushen 2014). He arrives at a sober view: the decade of Rroma inclusion, which was adopted in Sofia in 2005, and encompassed the countries of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Macedonia, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia and Spain, unfortunately cannot fulfil the expectations that it raised. Rroma are still affected by widespread poverty, discrimination, unemployment and insufficient access to public institutions such as schools and hospitals: “Despite this political recognition of an unconscionable social crisis, Roma remain among the poorest, unhealthiest, least educated and most marginalised European citizens. The data are devastating: Across Central and Southeast Europe, 90 percent of Roma live in poverty. Fewer than one third of adults have paid employment. Only 15 percent of young Roma have completed secondary or vocational school. Nearly 45 percent of Roma live in housing that lacks basic amenities. Life expectancy in Roma communities is 10-15 years less than in non-Roma communities, with many Roma lacking access to insurance and health care.” Kushen refers in his judgement to information from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP 2013). Reasoning with such figures is not without dangers, since the representation of the Rroma as uneducated, poor, and unhealthy is often interpreted by the polemical, public discourse as a cultural peculiarity of the minority, although these characteristics are inevitably a poverty phenomenon. Although is not to deny that numerous Rroma are poor and uneducated, the relevant question is whether such an argument can contribute to the  integration of the Rroma. In addition, surveys often only take into account the visible Rroma, because the integrated ones are hard to identify as Roma and difficult to contact. Not only images of misery are needed, which generate compassion, but also images of success that allow a positive identification.

Kushen continues with information about the marginalization of the Rroma in Italy, France, Sweden and Hungary, and then gets on to the latest report from the European Union on the situation of the Rroma. The report published on April the second this year, can not present success stories either: “In early April, the European Commission convened a “Roma Summit” and issued a report assessing how member states are doing in addressing the interconnected problems of poverty and discrimination which the Roma are facing. The report noted “the persistence of segregation” in education, a large and in some cases widening employment gap between Roma and non-Roma, big differences between Roma and non-Roma in health insurance coverage, and an “absence of progress” in addressing the need for housing. Finally, the report noted that discrimination remains “widespread” (compare European Commission 2014).

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09.04.2014 Stigma and the international Rroma Day

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On the occasion of the international Rroma Day, Grunau (2014) spoke with the president of the central council of German Sinti and Roma, Romani Rose. Rose’s assessment of the social integration of the Rroma is mediocre. While there has been progress in terms of political and historical recognition of the Rroma, there still are massive stigma and appalling living conditions in which Rroma have to exist: “In some areas some things have improved, but what we are not satisfied at all with is the situation of the Roma minority in Eastern Europe. There are situations that are catastrophic. […] These are particularly Bulgaria, Romania, but also the Czech Republic and Slovakia. There are informal ghettos that are without sewerage, without electricity, and water. There are villages, where over a thousand people live without any perspective. This situation has been known for many years. It is no longer acceptable. There is an infant mortality-rate that is four times higher and a life expectancy that is ten years lower compared to the majority population.” In this regard, Rose demands easier access to funding that doesn’t need not be refinanced by the states themselves. He proposes the creation of a special fund for the Rroma. Next, Rose criticizes the continuing discrediting and instrumentalization of the Rroma by right-wing nationalist parties and actors, but also by bourgeois politicians in the wake of the immigration debate in Western Europe. Thus, the openly racist Jobbik party made a share of 21% of the votes, in the elections in early April. At the end of the interview, Rose also points to the still highly distorted perception of the minority. 64% of the people of a survey said that they did not want Rroma as neighbours. However, many of them already have neighbours, friends or acquaintances that are Rroma are, but they do not know that they belong to the minority: “However, these 64 percent do not know that they already have work colleagues, neighbours and tenants, they do not know that they are shopping in stores with people who are members of the minority. Also in show business or in football, everywhere there are members of the minority.”

Caspari (2014) emphasizes in her conversation with the antiziganism researcher Markus End that there are not only negative but also positive stereotypes that encourage the idea of a cultural alterity of the Rroma: “Those who say that all Sinti and Roma make such great music just positively present a stereotype. It implies that members of the ethnic group are different, that they only make music and do not like to work as “we” do.” The same is the case with emphatic articles about the Rroma that still reproduce stereotypes: “In many – also benevolent – reports clichés of supposedly typical characteristics of the Roma are used, even though the Rroma do not exist at this general level. [ … ] An online editor recently headlined concerning the debate over free migration: “not only Roma are coming, but also academics” – as if there were only uneducated members of the ethnic group. About the nurse, the doctor or the construction worker, who are well integrated in Germany, rarely if ever is reported. Images that are added to the articles on the situation of Roma, often show poor, barefoot children. Here again, a cliché is conveyed.”

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04.04.2014 Polemical defamation of the Rroma

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The right-wing populist platform unzensuriert.at (2014) in its latest article defames the Rroma as unwilling to integrate and as a burden for Western European welfare states. In addition, a corruption bias is ascribed to them: “On a ‘EU Roma Summit’ on April 4th in Brussels, a “relief and development program” for the South-East European gypsies is planned to be implemented. Since the EU-extension onto Eastern Europe, those migrate in hordes from Bulgaria and Romania to Central and Western Europe. Municipalities such as Duisburg or Dortmund are close to a socio-political collapse due to immigration of the Rroma and the associated neglect of entire districts. [ … ] Such financial assistance has already in the past “fuelled” the corruption channels and could be diverted into the registers of Roma clan-chiefs and corrupt administrators and politicians connected with them.” Unzensuriert.at operates totally uncritically with a highly distorted, politicized, and value-loaded image of the Rroma. Through that, it propagates racist stereotypes such as the notion of criminal Rroma clan-chiefs and culturally related anti-social behaviour. The fact that such alleged “facts” are the result of centuries-old prejudices, is totally neglected by the platform. The same is true for the right-wing populist website Politically Incorrect (2014), which also propagates against the alleged exploitation of Western Europe through the Rroma.

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02.04.2014 Criminalization of Rroma in Duisburg

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Cnotka (2014) reports on the official cancellation of Rroma registered in Duisburg. The administration of Duisburg is said to have deliberately deleted many Rroma from the local registry, particularly the ones residing in the disputed tenement “In den Peschen”. However, the persons concerned are still resident there. This procedure is said to consciously push the concerned Rroma outside the law and enable their arrest and deportation. This viewpoint is contradicted by the city of Duisburg, which denies any criminalization of immigrated people: “Rolf Karling from the association “citizens for citizens” says that the city takes the Roma all their rights by unsubscribing them from the registry: “you can arrest and deport the people now at any time.” This view was contradicted by the city of Duisburg […]: Bulgarians and Romanians can stay legally and without a special permit in Germany. Just because they are not reported in Germany, they can not be arrested or deported.” Eduard Pusic, from integration organization “Zof”, claims that the Rroma were deregistered under pressure from the owner of the tenement. Overall, one could see anyhow an exodus into the districts Meiderich and Homberg. The Rroma of the tenement “In den Peschen” were repeatedly in the focus of a heated debate about immigration from Eastern Europe during last year. Polemicists instrumentalised this house and its inhabitants as a negative example of a “culture war” between Germans and Southeast-European immigrants. The integrated, unobtrusive Rroma, which make up the majority, were again once more not heard. Sanches (2014) quotes interior minister Thomas de Maizière, who, regarding the immigration from Romania and Bulgaria, claims that an above-average number of people from those countries would abuse social benefits. He contradicts several statistics and findings that cannot detect any additional usage of social benefits by immigrants from this region. These alleged facts are in fact emotionally charged views on an alleged mass immigration into the German social welfare system.

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02.04.2014 Insidious racism in France

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Several French newspapers report on the latest publication of the National Commission for Human Rights (CNCDH). The commission concludes that racism in France is in overall decline, but that it has become more insidious, subtle and sneaky as a result. Christine Lazerges, the president of the commission, concludes: “In the long view, racism in France decreases, the time of the riots is long gone, but the racism that is propagated today is much more insidious and no longer limited to the extremist edges. It pervades all strata of society.  […] The scapegoats today are particularly Rroma, who are stigmatized, including from the government, and then the Arab Muslims.” Whether the time of racially motivated riots actually belongs to the past may be doubted. Marches of right-wing groups against ethnic minorities such as the Rroma regularly take place in several Eastern European countries. The results of a recent survey, mandated by the commission, makes clear that negative stereotypes towards the Rroma are persisting in the minds of many people. 85% of the thousand respondents said that they believed that Rroma often exploit children and 78 % that they live of theft and the black market. In addition, the suspicion towards anti-racism actors is said to be significant. The commission recommends to continuously foster the education of the population, because it has been shown that there is a clear link between educational alienation and racism. The commission’s authors acknowledge that the Rroma are a heterogeneous group and are not belonging to a homogeneous culture or a single religion. However, they mistakenly assume that the Rroma live in France only since the early 20th century (CNCDH 2014: 201). However, they appear in France in early chronicles since the beginning of the 15th century. Tassel (2014) emphasizes the particular context in which the book is published. On the weekend of March 30th, the right-wing nationalist National Front, which bases significant parts of its policies on xenophobia, achieved a new high in the electorate. In addition, a new Prime Minister, Manuel Valls, has been inaugurated. He is notorious for his repressive policies towards the Rroma. The commission also emphasises the distinction between visible and invisible Rroma, a differentiation that has been fostered by the Rroma Foundation for quite some time: “Only a small minority of the Rroma define themselves in this way – between 15,000 and 20,000, who generally originate of a recent immigration from Bulgaria and Romania – live in a very large uncertainty, that means in the slums. The others are not “visible” and do not live in a state of extreme poverty. The vast majority consists of Gens du voyage, an estimated 350,000 people” (CNCDH 2014: 201-202). This view is contradicted by Tcherenkov/Laederich (2004: 4, 513), who make a clear distinction between travellers of European origin and Rroma. The latter are almost invariably not travelling and belong to the groups of the Manouche, Sinti, Gitans, Kaldersha, Lovara and Yugoslav Rroma (20 minutes 2014, La Croix 2014, CNCDH 2014, Tassel 2014, Vincent 2014).

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19.03.2014 The Rroma and the European free movement of persons

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Rosendorff (2014) reports on an informal Rroma camp in the Gutleutviertel of Frankfurt am Main. The 19 Romanian Rroma who lived so far on an industrial wasteland must vacate the location. The social security office will clarify whether the residents of the settlement have pursued social insurance work. If not, they are not entitled to social security benefits and are likely to be expelled, Rosendorff states. The 37-year-old Rrom Mirkea sees the asylum system as unfair. He criticizes: “My country is terribly corrupt, and I can not get a job there”, he says. “Why does Europe exist? We are all colleagues. I do not understand why so many German say ‘shit Romanians’. We have financed our food by collecting returnable bottles. We do not steal”, asserts Mirkea.” The deportation method described is in conflict with the free movement of workers within the European Union, to which Romania and Bulgaria belong since January 2014. Under this scheme, residents of member states are allowed to reside six months or longer in another EU-member state if they are actively looking for a job.

Die Linke (2014) criticizes in a recent statement the efforts of the government coalition to classify the countries Serbia, Macedonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina as safe countries of origin. With this decision, asylum reasons such as discrimination and exclusion would no longer be recognized: “As long as even only one asylum seeker from these countries is recognized as requiring protection, there can be no acceleration of proceedings by law. In 2013, at least 64 Serbian and 43 Macedonian asylum seekers were recognized as refugees or were given protection from deportation on humanitarian grounds. In two thirds of these cases, recognition was granted only by the courts, because the measures taken under an emergency procedure by the federal office for migration and refugees were wrong.” Die Linke criticizes correctly that the discrimination against Rroma is insufficiently highlighted by such country analyses. When determining migration policies, economic and not socio-political considerations are central to decisions, which is done at the expense of minorities such as the Rroma.

Gedziorowski (2014) spoke with Joachim Brenner, director of the Förderverein Roma. Brenner criticizes the widespread reservations about the minority and the polemical discourse against immigrants that is not dominated by facts but suspicion and emotions: “The whole terminology of tide, currents and wave – this is scaremongering. We took notice that we have to do more in the social counselling, but we also have to work with more people who live in poor conditions. [ … ] The last demoscopic studies by sociological institutes show that the resentments have not diminished, but still are manifest. When looking for housing Sinti and Roma have major problems.” Brenner further criticizes that it is above all a lack of political will, which leads to the marginalization of poor people and minorities, and not the lack of financial resources, which are certainly present. This may be seen with reference to the housing project Kulturcampus Bockenheim, which encountered great resistance by the welfare department from the very beginning.

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07.03.2014 Paul-Marie Coûteaux relaunches the Rroma debate anew

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Le Monde (2014) reports on the opinions of Paul-Marie Coûteau. Coûteau belongs to the national-conservative and Eurosceptic party Souveraineté, indépendance et libertés (SIEL), which he founded himself. On his blog, he expresses the idea that Rroma should be put in specialy established camps. The article has the telling title “On the establishment of Rroma in Paris and the slow extinction of the national sense of honour”. Coûteau perceives the sight of impoverished Rroma in the streets of Paris as aesthetically disturbing: “Their presence is an unworthy sight for Paris and unworthy of France, unworthy of a great country, and a problem for the aesthetic order.” He stands for election for the electoral coalition Rassemblement Bleu Marine as mayor for the sixth district of Paris. Coûteau expresses himself negatively towards the free movement of persons with Romania and Bulgaria, against which he voted.

Coûteau’s perspective on the Rroma is as one-sided as the majority of the public debate, which focuses only on visible Rroma. It is also telling, that he states to be hurt in his national honour by the sight of Rroma. He therefore reveals himself as a proponent of a radical order-policy that puts aesthetic feelings before human dignity, which is totally absurd. SOS Racisme has announced that it will file a complaint against Coûteau because of his racist remarks (compare 20 minutes 2014, Libération 2014, Théveniaud 2014).

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28.02.2014 Die Zeit criticizes the victim discourse about Rroma

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In her article in Die Zeit, Lau (2014) criticizes the victim role to which Rroma activists are said to refer to constantly in Germany. In the debate about poverty migrants from Romania and Bulgaria, one mainly talks about the immigrants, but not with them. This also has to do with the focus of the activism of Romani Roses, who has been working for the rights of the Rroma in Germany for several decades. Rose focuses his policy on the recognition that Rroma were victims of the Nazi genocide, whereby other topics are to receiving less than enough attention: “Ironically, the central council and Romani Rose prevent elsewhere that the understanding between newly arrived Roma and the majority society improves. Since he can remember, Romani Rose fought for the recognition as victims of genocide, a fact repeatedly disputed by historians. […] Since they share neither religion nor written culture, there is actually only one link between the Sinti and Roma: the experience of persecution. And that is the reason why discrimination is the central topic in the political statements of their community, rather than strategies of advancement.” Lau’s article tries to find out why there is a lack of solution strategies in the current debate about immigrants from Southeast Europe. However, she is wrong when she accuses Rroma to stick to a victim status. This criticism was already expressed in the beginning of 2013 by another author: In his book Zigeuner – Begegnungen mit einem ungeliebten Volk, Rolf Bauerdick criticised the lack of self-initiative in improving the social integration of the Rroma. This criticism is one-sided and hides the mechanisms of exclusion. Although it is right that a successful integration involves two sides, promotion and self-initiative, the latter one can only happen if the necessary conditions are given. Otherwise, suppression remains the dominant factor.

Just the opposite is argued by the TAZ in its interview with the historian Patricia Pientka. Pientka researched the story of a Rroma detention camp in Berlin-Marzahn. The historian is shattered about how bad the persecution of the Rroma in Germany was researched so far, also concerning the Berlin-Marzahn detention camp. In 1936, Rroma were selected via by sociographic criteria for the camp: caravans, many children and certain profession groups were decisive for the internment as well as the living on welfare. In 1938, the pseudo-scientific criteria of the racial hygiene research unit under Robert Ritter were implemented. The continuity between the war and the post-war period is particularly shocking. Perpetrators from the Nazi era were appointed as experts in courts, where they could play down or even qualify the war horrors with false statements: “In Berlin and elsewhere, the police departments for “Gypsy questions” established at end of 1938 are of central importance. In Berlin, the head of the department was Leo Karsten. After the war, he was superintendent of the police of Ludwigshafen and throughout Germany was the appointed expert on compensation issues for Sinti and Roma. His testimony led, among other things, to the verdict that the senate didn’t recognize the Marzahn detention camp as a labour camp […]. One can definitely say that the racist persecution of Sinti and Roma in Nazi Germany hasn’t been critically analysed until today. We have a huge deficit. This is also reflected in the case with Roma from South Eastern Europe, for instance Serbia, who are absolutely not perceived as descendants of Holocaust victims – what they definitely are” (Memarnia 2014).

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28.02.2014 Tilo Sarrazin propagates the alleged Rroma problem

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The highly controversial author Tilo Sarrazin, who sparked a debate about immigration and the safeguarding of German values with his 2010 book Deutschland schafft sich ab, rallies in a recent statement against the alleged taboo of the so-called Rroma problem. Sarrazin, as well as other conservative exponents, assume that Rroma do in fact pose a problem for the German social welfare system and the German society. He therewith strengthens the statements of xenophobic reductionists, who imply that Rroma lack the will to integrate and culturally tend to criminality. Sarrazin says: “Basically, the immigration from Bulgaria and Romania presents no other problems than the one from Lithuania and Poland. But there is a special topic and that is: Roma. But that is not clearly named and is one of the biggest taboos. […] Whether you say “Gypsies”, “Sinti and Roma”, “economic refugees” or “poverty tourists”, you have to tackle the problem at the source, which lead to widespread reservations, and not hide the problems through different names” (Focus 2014). Sarrazin therefore propagates the absurd idea that Rroma are harder to integrate than other ethnic groups, which is completely preposterous. The propagating of a Rroma problem spreads false notions of cultural alterity and incompatibility. The Rroma are just as willing to integrate as members of other ethnic groups. That the already well-integrated Sinti are completely negated in this debate is astonishing (compare Neues aus Braunschweig und Wolfsburg 2014, Ad-Hoc-News 2014).

A contrary position is taken by Vosskühler (2014). She questions the distinction between economically useful and un-useful immigrants with facts that are supported by statistics: „Romanians and Bulgarians are more commonly associated with social benefits than other EU foreigners“ – not true. „Romanians and Bulgarians abuse social welfare in a big way“ – not true. „All Romanians and Bulgarians who come to Germany are poverty immigrants.“ – Also not true.” What is needed are entrepreneurs, who are willing to integrate low-skilled migrants. The free movement of persons is not up for debate.

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14.02.2014 An unemotional perspective on immigrants from Southeast Europe

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Mappes-Niediek (2014) takes a dispassionate look at immigrants from South East Europe who are settling down in Germany. He tries to draw a differentiated picture of the reasons for their migration, which lies beyond simple generalizations. Poor Rroma from Southeast Europe don’t migrate to Western Europe or Germany with the aim to abuse the local social welfare system. They come with the aim to lead a life in dignity. Their own family and close friends provide a social safety network, on which one can rely on during hard times: “The poverty immigrants from Romania and Bulgaria don’t come here because of the social benefits in Germany, but because you can live a better life here. They come with their families and with close friends. [ … ] The poorest of the poor who live in Romania, mainly in rural areas, mostly don’t migrate at all.” Mappes-Niediek then turns against the widely held view that education is the key to solving most problems. Education only brings something, the author states, if Rroma are allowed to integrate into the economy and the economy offers enough available jobs. Otherwise, a university degree doesn’t helps to improve one’s situation: “Education is not the key, or at least not there where the poverty immigrants come from. Everywhere in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe the relationship between education and a good life is broken, and indeed for everyone, not only for the Roma. An entire generation has made the experience that education doesn’t help in anything. They have seen it with their parents. The father was an engineer, his mother a Russian teacher. Today, the mother goes to clean and the father is drinking […].” With these statements, Mappes-Niediek takes a pessimistic view at the stagnant economies of many countries of the former Eastern bloc. The denial of benefits and possibilities to integrate is said to create what many want to prevent: slums, problems, crime. Mappes-Niediek takes a dispassionate look at the debate about poverty immigrants from Eastern Europe. However, he also perpetuates ideas of mainly impoverished, marginalized Rroma, as they are spread by the mass media and therefore established and culturalised.

This view contrasts with the short article in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, which focuses on the work of the social worker Lucia Bleibel with immigrant Rroma. Bleibel grew up in Slovakia and speaks Rromanes and Romanian. On behalf of the Internationale Bund and the city of Hanau she takes care of the integration of marginalized Rroma in the Hessen town. Bleibel’s task is to remind the immigrants of the compulsory schooling, the German health care system and the compliance with general rules. The short text focuses entirely on the visible, impoverished Rroma and thereby keeps politicized notions of cultural alterity upright, despite or perhaps because of its emphatic perspective on the topic (Glaser-Lotz 2014).

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14.02.2014 Eight-year-old Rroma girl killed by a fire

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Numerous French newspapers report about an incident in a Rroma camp in Bobigny. For reasons not yet known, in that camp in question, an unexpected fire started. The informal accommodations were giving refuge to more and more Romanian and Bulgarian Rroma, who fled from forced evictions in the neighbourhood. At the time the fire started, the camp encompassed around 200 inhabitants. About one-fifth of the informal dwellings were destroyed. The camp itself had no access to running water, which would have allowed to extinguish the fire, although a demand had been filed to the city major months ago. The victim of the fire, an eight-year-old Rroma girl, had been enrolled in a primary school in Bobigny. Rroma camps in France are regularly affected by fires and other incidents. However, there is uncertainty about how the fires are started. Manuel Valls stresses that they are linked to the precarious safety conditions in many camps, what legitimizes his harsh eviction practices. Another possibility is that they are linked to politically motivated arson. During the year 2013, twenty-two Rroma camps were affected by incidents, according to the Ligue des droits de l’ Homme, which compromised about 2’000 people. The mayor of Bobigny, Catherine Peyge, pointed attention to the persisting, severe marginalization of the Rroma that has made this incident possible. In collaboration with Cécile Duflot, the minister for social housing, they are trying to find permanent accommodation for the Rroma affected by the fire (Le Parisien 2014, Le point in 2014, Le Nouvel Observateur in 2014, Libération 2014 BFMTV 2014) .

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14.02.2014 The Rroma policy of the European Union and the free movement of persons

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Gutschker (2014) spoke with justice commissioner and vice-president of the European Commission, Viviane Reding, on the Rroma policy of the European Union. In the first part of the interview, the conversation focused around the question as to whether social benefits for non-working immigrants from EU-member states are legal or not. Right-wing politicians regularly accuse immigrant Rroma to unfairly burden the German social welfare system. Reding takes the position that the social benefits come to the good of immigrants with very low wages who are dependent on assistance. Nobody will receive social assistance just for the good of it, she states. For the interviewer, the debate on social benefits is in truth an argument about pan-European solidarity. For Viviane Reding however, the debate circles around questions of a liberal economic market, which allows the needed workforce to freely circulate. It is astonishing that even Reding holds the idea most of the so-called poverty immigrants are Rroma, although the ethnicity is not recorded in statistics. She sees the need to support these disadvantaged Rroma, so that the spiral of poverty can be broken. Concerning the social benefits received by EU-immigrants, Reding sees the numbers as strongly exaggerated. Only a very small part of the support payments go to immigrants from other EU countries. An amount three times as high is said to go to immigrants from third countries. Reding also wants that the EU countries better use their allocated social funds from the European Union and defuse municipal focal points. The restriction of the free movement of persons – as the Swiss electorate decided on the 9th of February – is said to be incompatible with the principle of a shared internal market: “You can not take advantage of the internal market with all the advantages for export and at the same time restrict the free movement of persons. In December, we had a meeting of EU interior ministers, and all agreed to the above – with the exception of the British. There was also agreement that the right to move freely does not establish a right to access the social systems. Rights are always associated with duties” (compare Epoch Times 2014, Spiegel 2014).  

Frigelj (2014) reports on the visit of EU-commissioner László Andor in Duisburg. Duisburg was almost constantly in the headlines during 2013. Again and again, newspapers reported – in a more or less populist fashion – on impoverished, criminal Rroma clans from Romania and Bulgaria, which are supposedly flooding into the city. László Andor tried to get an idea of the situation on the spot. He attended employment-assistance institutions, talked with immigrants, residents, social workers, and police officers. Andor acknowledged, the article states, that the city is dealing with a problem of poverty and Germany and its municipalities were entitled to money from the new “relief fund for the poorest” of the European Union. The article seems factual and objective, but indirectly spreads the idea that Rroma are almost exclusively poorly educated, marginalized people who escape poverty and discrimination in their home countries: “The highly qualified doctors and nurses are attracted mainly to southern Germany. To Duisburg and Dortmund, which have a high proportion of vacant dwellings and lower end real estate, where up to 90% unqualified immigrants with large families are drawn. From around 600 monthly newcomers, almost half are children.” That there are also many well-integrated Rroma in Germany is not mentioned.

 

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07.02.2014 „I Met Lucky People: The Story of the Romani Gypsies“ by Yaron Matras

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Matras is a linguist and advocates the rights of the Rroma. His new book “I Met Lucky People”, which was published on 6th of February. According to the reviewer Katharine Quarmby, the book presents a heterogeneous, non-political view on the Rroma, their social organization, their language, their traditions and identity. A non-political perspective is particularly desirable due to the polemical, un-objective debate about mass immigration from Romania and Bulgaria. However, the book is not confined to the presentation of alleged facts, but holds a mirror up in front of the readers and shows them how the widespread knowledge about the Rroma tells more about the authors than about Rroma themselves: “The book […] makes a strong argument for his contention, that the way we gadjes, or non-Roma people, talk and write about the Romani people reflects more about us than reflecting their reality. This reflection is not a pretty one.” Matras remind the persecution of the Rroma in Europe, and also in Great Britain, where the author is based. The chapter on the language Rromanes falls into the expertise of the author, as he is a linguist. Quarmby qualifies as particularly compelling Martras’ writing about the creation of myths and identities by the majority society. This topic has already been investigated in the German-speaking world by Klaus Michael Bogdal. Towards the end of the book review, the reviewer outs herself as also charged with prejudice, when she indicates that the immigrant Rroma, British Rroma and Irish Travellers are said to only meet in scrap yards. She doesn’t seem to have an awareness of non marginalized, invisible Rroma living in Great Britain. Finally, Quarmby points to the important question of whether it is appropriate that non-Rroma represent Rroma people and to what extent this is practice is challenged by Rroma. Matras is optimistic that Rroma activists, academics and writers are increasingly questioning this status quo (Quarmby 2014).

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07.02.2014 The integration of the Rroma as a pan-European task

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On the occasion of the visit of the Romanian President in Berlin, Von Borstel and Lachmann address the roles of the individual EU countries in the integration of Rroma. Von Borstel/Lachmann quote the federal office of labour which estimates that about 180,000 Rumanians and Bulgarians will migrate to Germany, from which a quarter is reported to have University degrees. For what period of time this forecast is done is not stated. After this relatively differentiated preface, the article quickly becomes very one-sided. The authors only speak of the salient, visible Rroma and extrapolate them to the norm: “Even at that time [2013] they were drawn to the district of Neukölln, the melting pot of Berlin with residents from 160 countries. And quickly through organised begging some Roma became an integral part of the cityscape: Women with small children begging in front of churches, larger children harassing tourists, young people making noise on old instruments in the subway, or annoying drivers as “window cleaners” at major intersections. Every now and then a man from the clan comes and collects the begged money.” Some time later, the Romanian president Băsescu is quoted indicating that these very visible Rroma are a minority of the minority. But the statement is immediately followed by the next stereotype: the migrating Rroma are said to be the ones that Romania failed to integrate. Immigrants are sweepingly made into problem cases. Rroma willing to integrate do not exist, the article suggests. The European Union social affairs minister László Andor is quoted saying that the debate about immigration must be more rational and less emotional. The Rroma Contact Point strongly agrees with that.

The right-wing populist platform unzensuriert.at (2014) presents the visit of president Traian Băsescu in Berlin in an extremely biased fashion: it only emphasizes the negative aspects and is openly racist towards Rroma: “More and more Roma migrate from the two South-Eastern European countries to Austria, Germany or France and thereby cause a whole series of problems; from social welfare to crime. Cities like Dortmund or Duisburg and the district of Neukölln have seen thousands of Roma arrive. Side effects such as begging, crime and the neglect of entire districts are the consequence.” Such generalising, unreflecting, and xenophobic reporting can only be described as stupid. The comment column of the article is also permeated by racist arguments.

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07.02.2014 The Tagesspiegel fuels the idea of a “Rroma problem”

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After the debate on immigration from Romania and Bulgaria to Germany has now run for over a year, a few journalists like Christoph von Marschall still argue that because of political correctness, the debate doesn’t address the topic of potentially dangerous Rroma immigrant. What he identifies as too much political correctness is in fact a one-sided focus on the members of an ethnic minority. To ethnicize immigration doesn’t solve anything. Where he obtained the information that the immigrant population described by him is in fact primarily consisting of Rroma is not discussed. The ethnic membership is not covered by the immigration statistics for ethical reasons. Instead, Von Marschall relies on his supposedly profound knowledge as Rroma expert and spreads absurd and false ideas of travelling, mostly illiterate Rroma and the cultural incompatibility of Rroma and ethnic Germans:  “In the overwhelming majority – in other EU countries it is openly spoken about – these migrants are Roma. [ … ] Focal points, where this migration creates tensions with citizens and communities also exist in Berlin: in Neukölln, in Wedding, in parts of Schöneberg and Reinickendorf. What else is to expect when so different cultures clash? Roma have avoided for centuries the powers of regional authorities as a “traveling nation”; they developed their own solidarity and acquisition systems best suited to their way of life, long before there was an EU, guaranteeing freedom of movement. In Germany they now face modern administration for the sedentary. [ … ] Many Roma are illiterate. [ … ] Roma need modified integration concepts. They do not accept the usual help for the homeless, because their families can not be separated by gender.“

Von Marschall exercises epistemic violence on the Rroma by spreading false information about them. More insight into his own ignorance would not hurt him. Many Rroma can read and write, most Rroma are sedentary and strive to achieve successful integration, if one allows them to. Among the immigrants there are also many ethnic Romanians and Bulgarians. There can be no talk of cultural incompatibility. The supposed incompatibility is ascribed them entirely by Von Marschall with his massive prejudices. Fortunately, his article also imbued with the insight that successful integration requires the cooperation of all parties involved and should not be dominated by fear and prejudice. That after all, is to his credit.

Von Marschall, Christoph (2014) Bei der Zuwanderung werden Probleme geleugnet. In: Der Tagesspiegel online vom 6.2.2014. http://www.tagesspiegel.de/meinung/migration-von-roma-aus-bulgarien-und-rumaenien-bei-der-zuwanderung-werden-probleme-geleugnet/9441234.html

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