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18.06.2014 Obrnice receives award for its integration policy

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The Czech town Obrnice was awarded the European integration award for its successful inclusion of the Rroma into social life of the city. Rosenzweig’s (2014) article focuses on the work of the two social workers Milan Grundza and Zdeněk Nistor. They check if everything is in order and at night, send young people back home or tell them to linger somewhere else. The peculiarity of the social work of the two officers: Milan and Zdeněk are Rroma. Their work is said to be representative for the successful integration of the minority in Obrnice. However, it is noticeable that Rosenzweig mentions only positive aspects and denies still existing problems. The mayor of Obrnice, Drahomira Miklošová, sees the reason for the success of her integration strategy in a policy of simultaneously promoting and demanding: “Receiving this award from Strasbourg was a wonderful moment and gave me energy to keep on going. This has convinced me not to give into the negative voices that say that the situation requires radical solutions. For me, it is vital that nothing is freely given – I always say that the rewards are only given in exchange for something else. I will help you, but only if you do something in return. If you take this approach, I think that all cities in the country could make the same progress […].” However, it remains unclear how the integration policy in Obrnice, in addition to the example given, proceeds in detail.

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18.06.2014 Rroma and blonde children: racial prejudices remain

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The Greek newspaper Greek Reporter reports on a new case of possible child abduction. Neither the authorities nor the journalists seem to have learned anything from the case of the blond Rroma girl Maria. Instead, they continue to set out from racial prejudice and criteria: a begging Rromni in Rhodes is accused to have kidnapped and abused a blonde, blue eyed, male infant that was with her. Prosecutors demand a DNA test as well as a clear proof confirming the woman’s motherhood (compare Zikakou 2014). The idea of Rroma as child traffickers exists since centuries, as critical literary studies have shown. They are the projection of distrust on the Rroma, who just arrived in Europe, and were accused of paganism and a criminal disposition. These prejudices are an expression of uncertainty in contact with a new group of people who through their mere presence question the rigid power structure of medieval society. However, Rroma converted shortly after or even before their arrival in Europe to Christianity and clearly demonstrated their willingness to integrate.

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18.06.2014 “Günter Grass honors Hungarian Rrom Jenő Zsigó”

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The Hungarian Rrom Jenő Zsigó was awarded a prize by Günter Grass’ “Foundation for theRoma people”: “With the award, Zsigó’s lifetime work is rewarded, the secretariat of Nobel laureate said in Lübeck on Thursday. Zsigó was the founder and long-time director of the institution Romano Kher in Budapest, and chairman of the Hungarian Roma parliament. […]Since the 1980s, he was “an independent and dedicated spokesperson for political and cultural affairs of the Roma in Hungary” The foundation stated.” Zsigó was co-founder of the Hungarian Rroma parliament that championed both politically and culturally the interests of the Rroma and initiated the first scholarship program for Hungarian Rroma, who are still heavily discriminated against in the education system (compare Focus/DPA 2014, Hamburger Abendblatt/DPA 2014, Tiroler Tageszeitung/DPA 2014).

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18.06.2014 “It is time for historians to write Romani history into the mainstream”

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Taylor (2014), an historian at the Birkbeck University in London, talked about her new book “Another Darkness, Another Dawn: A History of Gypsies, Roma and Travellers”. At the beginning, she addressed the intense politicization and instrumentalization of Rroma by politics and journalism. The Rroma are once again made to scapegoats for all social ills and abused in political debates about immigration, debates that are dominated by fear mongering.

From a historical perspective, Taylor states that until today, Rroma are not part of the official historiography. However, Rroma are not granted separate history either, rather, they are ascribed an existence in a timeless bubble untouched by modern life. Taylor wants to overcome this deficiency with her book, and wants to complement the official, popular history with the history of the Rroma. She does it by connecting important historical upheavals, such as the emergence and decline of empires, wars, political upheavals, the expansion of the state of law, enlightenment and social crises with the history of the Rroma and examining mutual influences: “If exploring the history of Romani peoples was a way of holding up a mirror on the societies in which they lived, it was also a salutatory lesson that it is naive to believe in a progressive view of history: things don’t always get better, especially if you belong to a stigmatized ethnic group. […] Carrying out the research for this book showed how the enslavement of Gypsies coexisted under the Ottomans with remarkable cultural diversity and autonomy; how branding, mutilations and ‘gypsy hunts’ occurred at the same time that Gypsies established themselves across Europe and the Americas; and how despite developments in education and attitudes toward minorities across modern Europe and the U.S. has failed to bring anything like active acceptance of the place of Romani peoples within its societies.” Taylor’s book seems to be an interesting, new contribution to the historiography of the Rroma, even though one cannot critically assess her book with her own review. Her book should be read with a critical attitude, as many scientists and Rroma experts, despite their good intentions, reproduce and maintain false information about the Rroma.

  • Taylor, Becky (2014) It’s Time Historians Get Past the Stereotype of Romani Peoples and Write Them into History. In: History News Network online vom 15.6.2014. http://hnn.us/article/155822
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18.06.2014 “Judicial ethics body: citing “Gypsy crime” unethical”

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Politics.hu (2014) reports on a verdict of the Hungarian national council of judicial ethics. The council passed judgment that the verdict of judge Erika Mucs from Gyula was unethical. The judge concluded in lawsuit on the prohibition of the right-wing extremist citizens militia Szebb Jövőért Polgárőr Egyesület (Civil Guard Association for a Better Future) that the term “Gypsy crime” is legitimate, as “criminals” and “gypsies” cicrles would not coincide but strongly overlap. Lajos Makai, president of the Hungarian judicial council, subsequently started proceedings against Mucs. The investigation came to the conclusion that Mucs’ behaviour is unethical and that she broke the judges’ moral code. The latter since she didn’t evaluate the case she was handling objectively. Tunde Hando from the national judicial council said in a statement that the objectivity of the judges must be comprehensible in speech and writing. In addition, a new code of ethics is being adopted, which will be published at the end of 2014 and to which all Hungarian judges must obey.

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18.06.2014 Lety: protest against pig farm at the site of the former concentration camp

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Several newspapers reported on the protest by activists in several European countries, who objected to the presence of a pig farm at the site of a former concentration camp in Lety, in the Czech Republic. In the Czech Republic itself, several representatives of the European Grassroots Antiracist Movement (EGAM) were present. They remembered the approximately 1,300 Rroma women and children who were interned between August 1942 and May 1943 in the concentration camp of Lety. Most of them were then deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau and gassed there. In Lety itself, around 330 Rroma died, most of them children. They perished of typhoid fever, hunger, or because of the catastrophic conditions in the camp. Under the communist government, an industrial pig farm was built on the site of the former concentration camp. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, members of the Rroma community and human rights activists have called for the demolition of the pig farm and the establishment of a memorial (compare 20 minutes 2014, L’essentiel 2014, The Times of Israël 2014).

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13.06.2014 Daily Mail: residents of Hexthorpe announce pogroms against Rroma

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Brooke (2014) of the populist newspaper Daily Mail reports on social turmoil in Hexthorpe, England. According to residents, social unrest is imminent unless the authorities take action against tensions with immigrated Rroma. Brooke’s and his witnesses’ reasoning is based on mistrust, prejudice and strong generalizations. It is telling that the Rroma themselves, which are blamed for noise, trash, and more crime, remain a faceless mass and don’t have their say in the article, apart from a photo with youths in tracksuits. However, that they are indeed Rroma is anything but clear. Instead, political propaganda on Rroma abusing welfare is mixed with striking extreme cases. Such journalism is demagogic, as one can read in the comment column. There it is teeming with xenophobic statements and invitations to vote UKIP. This has nothing to do with objective journalism anymore.

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13.06.2014 Daily Mail: Rroma-palaces in Rumania accused to be built with criminal funds

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Reilly (2014) reports the Rroma-palaces in Hunedoara, a city in central Romania. The magnificent buildings are said to be built almost exclusively with money from criminal activities. The same applies to the sports cars of the homeowners, who are also said to be paid for with criminal funds acquired in Great Britain. Reilly unmistakeably mixes political views on delinquent migrants with racist prejudices against Rroma. That there are also Rroma who successfully emerged from the system change, and made their money by clever trading activities in post-socialist capitalism, remains completely unmentioned. Instead, all owners of the magnificent buildings are accused to be part of criminal organizations. The Rroma palaces are now threatened by demolition due to lacking building permits: “Gaudy palaces suspected of being built by Romany criminal masterminds on the back of criminal gang activities in the UK and other European countries are facing demolition. Authorities in Hunedoara, a city in central-western Romania, are threatening to tear down the so-called ‘gypsy palaces’ dotting the region because all were built illegally, and many of them are safety hazards. Police believe most were constructed on the back of illicit criminal enterprises abroad.” As Reilly herself notes, the finding that the palaces were built with illegal funds are based on presumptions. Based on assumptions, one should not publish articles that put other people in the pillory.

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13.06.2014 Die Welt defames Rroma through connotation with criminal clans

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Die Welt (2014) reports on a trial against 45 members of a Polish Rroma clan, who is said to have been robbing seniors for money and jewellery by applying the so-called “grandson trick”: “Since November 2012, the Hamburg prosecutor’s office and the department of organized crime (OC) in the state criminal investigations department conducted investigations against the Polish perpetrators, based on suspicion of gang based commercial fraud. After an extensive criminal investigation, OC investigators closed on the family gang, which is regarded as the inventor of the so-called grandson trick. […] For the past 15 years, the police is aware of the deceptive practices of the Polish Roma clan. That the trick is very successful, is shown by numerous YouTube videos, where the family members brag about their wealth.” The reference to the ethnicity is completely unnecessary. Through the correlation of the facts described with a criminal, Polish Rroma clan, Die Welt suggests a clear connection between the offenses described and the ethnicity. This connotation is completely unnecessary. It reinforces racist ideas and resentment against the minority. In addition, the newspaper nourishes stereotypes of organized, criminal clans among the Rroma. However, this idea is wrong. The majority of Rroma are living respectable and inconspicuous lives. Rroma are not organized hierarchically, as repeatedly suggested by the newspapers. This idea is the result of the projection of the feudal, medieval order onto the Rroma. The Sächsische Zeitung and the Luxembourgian Tageblatt argue in the same problematic way (compare Flückiger 2014 I/II).

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13.06.2014 History of Rroma pogroms in Bulgaria

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Lausberg (2014) reports on the tragic, historical continuity of Rroma pogroms in Bulgaria. The acts of violence against Rroma have especially increased since the decline of the communist system, but actually reach back for centuries: “Racism against Roma has a centuries-old tradition, which was once stronger and sometimes weaker, depending on historical events. Especially after the end of the communist regime in Bulgaria, the Roma in Bulgaria see themselves threatened by violent, racist acts. Resentment because of their skin colour, language and culture as well as discriminatory treatment by authorities, police and judiciary is part of everyday life for the Roma in Bulgaria.” He continues to go into the details of individual pogroms and incidents and tries to give possible explanations for the racist violence. One aspect is economic crises and the resulting impoverishment of broad sections of the population. Combined with a low level of education, more and more people are willing to accept racist slogans in such a situation. Furthermore, there is completely one-sided information about criminal Rroma which is supposed to underpin their alleged anti-social behaviour. Another problem is that racist acts of violence are often not identified as such, but are trivialized as “normal” criminal acts. Lausberg also discusses the various reasons for a migration to Western Europe, which are often excluded in the polemical debate about mass immigration: “The reasons for the emigration of Bulgarian Roma especially to western states of the EU, including the federal republic, are on one hand the hope for better economic prospects in the target countries. On the other hand, it is the manifest racism of the (white) majority of the population, which is also responsible for the emigration. […] In Sofia, and other cities, at the end of socialism mostly teenagers or young adults who hunted Roma formed militant racist groups. On 29.10.1992, a group of students from the Lovech-sports school attacked three Roma in a disco. Three days later, one Rom due to cerebral haemorrhage caused by the blows. On 31.10.1993, the Roma Club in Varna was attacked and the furniture destroyed. In winter 1992/93, begging Roma street children were systematically beaten by students of an elite university.”

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13.06.2014 Lawsuit: administrative country assessment versus personal experience

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Humphreys (2014) reports on a trial in Canada on the occasion of an asylum application of a Hungarian Romany family. At the centre of interest lies the case of the Rrom Mario Gyula Varga. While the mother and the half-brother of the man were able to present to the court convincingly that they were victims of domestic violence by the father of Varga, a violent pimp, and were persecuted by neo-Nazi groups, the application of Mario Varga himself was rejected as implausible. From the perspective of the judge, the applicant could not demonstrate convincingly that he was indeed a victim of violence in Hungary. Instead, he had argued with the general persecution of the Rroma in Hungary. This general discrimination against Rroma the judge ruled improbable: ““It seems to me that [Mr. Varga’s lawyer’s] submission is that the only reasonable assessment of country conditions in Hungary is that each and every one of its 200,000 to 500,000 citizens of Roma background has a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, and that on the balance of probabilities, each and every one’s life is at personal risk, or that each and every one is at risk of cruel and unusual treatment or punishment. If it be so, then Hungary is a failed state. Yet it is not”, Justice Harrington wrote in his ruling last week.” The case shows that evidence for individual asylum applications is extremely difficult to prove. Official governmental countries analyses are juxtaposed with subjective experiences, which usually are express only orally, but cannot be verified. Then, the credibility of the argument is an important criterion. The verdict is therefore also associated with the assessment of the conditions in a country and related value judgments. The estimation of compliance with the rights of minorities in Hungary is far from evident, as can be read in the critical, Hungarian press. Violations of minority rights and rights against discrimination repeatedly occur. Therefore, the verdict of judge Harrington that Hungary is a failed state, if the arguments of the applicant are true, is not that far-fetched.

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13.06.2014 Marseille: forced eviction of Rroma settlement is imminent

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Several French newspapers report about the imminent eviction of an informal Rroma-settlement in Marseille. Around four hundred Rroma, including many children, would be affected by the planned eviction. Several aid organizations protested against the plans of the prefecture. The request for a moratorium on evictions was rejected by the administration. Paul Kopp, president of Rencontres Tziganes, criticized in a statement that the expulsion policy pushes the Rroma from one camp to the next, but changes nothing to their long-term situation. A moratorium on evictions would allow them to plan and implement a long-term integration. Civallero (2014) summarizes: “According to the prefecture, the population of the Roma in Marseille amounts to 1,200 to 1,300 people. In 26 areas settlements have formed, since the beginning of the year, five evictions took place, according to the organizations. In October last year, the largest camp in Marseille was evicted, located in the quarter Capelette of the 10th arrondissement, many families subsequently settled on the site of La Parette.” – In fact, it’s astonishing how persistently the French authorities evict the informal settlements at regular intervals, although new settlements are create shortly thereafter. Long-term solutions are needed. These depend primarily on the will of the policy makers. Does one give the Rroma the opportunity to integrate, or does one continue to marginalize them? Integration is a process that requires concessions and efforts from both sides, the migrants and society, respectively the state. Already last winter, the camp of La Parette was targeted, but at that time, the eviction was successfully prevented. Now the organizations and residents of the camp want to draw attention to the concerns of the Rroma with a poster campaign. The posters show the residents of the camp and ask the observer what are his/her thoughts towards the evictions (compare Delabroy 2014 Miguet 2014).

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13.06.2014 Rroma in the Czech Republic: between self-determination and discrimination

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Schultheis (2014) reports on the Czech-German project “Roma-generation 2.0”. The aim of the project is to motivate the young generation of Rroma to break out of the victim role and to determine and shape their own future as far as possible. This in spite of the fact that the discrimination against Rroma is still strong, and there is marginalization especially in schools and in the labour market. Around one third of Rroma children are assigned to special schools for mentally disabled, which is clearly racially motivated and fighting such assignments is beyond the power of the Rroma alone. However, an active self-determination is an important first step to overcoming exclusion and towards the abolition and prohibition of segregation. Martina Horváthová, of the organizing committee of the project, explains: “The aim of this project is to talk to young Roma and non-Roma about what it means to be an active citizen. We want to give young people opportunities to demonstrate how they can get involved. We Roma have the right to use all opportunities of EU-membership – just like everyone else. Roma must stop to stigmatize themselves to a discriminated minority.” Magdalene Karvanov, from the Open Society Foundations, is committed to get Rroma parents actively engaged on the educational opportunities of their children: “We want that Roma parents become major players themselves and fight for better educational opportunities for their children. Through our campaign, we have managed to give them greater self-confidence. When we asked the parents before the campaign, what career they wished for their children, they said I do not know, they will probably live on welfare. And now they say: my child should become a doctor or lawyer. They have higher expectations and get more active themselves.”

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13.06.2014 Swiss Federal office for migration accuses Rroma of abuse of return assistance

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Von Burg (2014) reports on a new report by the federal office for migration. An external evaluation of the federal office comes to the conclusion that the return assistance is functioning well, but in some cases has issues. The abuse of return assistance through Eastern European Rroma is cited as an example. Thereby a poverty phenomenon that also concerns other ethnic groups is made to be a Rroma problem. As part of the immigration debate in France, Germany and Great Britain on the occasion of the free movement of persons with Romania and Bulgaria, one can observe repeatedly that Rroma represented according to political views and debates and exploited for them. Such a categorization is racist something that does not seem to come to the mind of Von Burg and the migration commissioner Eduard Gnesa. However, the following statements are clearly demagogic: “It was the Roma from Eastern Europe, who specifically exploited the system of return assistance: they made hopeless asylum applications and then travelled back home with repatriation grants of up to 4000 francs per head. The Swiss special commissioner for international cooperation on migration, Eduard Gnesa, says: «From this example one can prove it. If you give too much money, this leads to this effect.» Roma don’t receive return assistance anymore since two years.” How these people were identified as Rroma is not clear. Was it from their asylum applications or by other means? The refusal of return aid for a specific ethnic group is simply racist. The fact that members of other ethnic groups can also exploit the return assistance because of poverty is completely neglected. Eduard Gnesa and Christian von Burg show no understanding for the differentiation of different phenomena. Instead, they present the issue as if it were exclusively Rroma that take advantage of return assistance. Thereby, the federal office for migration, which is indirectly mentioned as the source of information and should be aware of such methodologies as the very first, practices an ethnicization of poverty phenomena. However, poverty has nothing to do with ethnicity, apart from the exclusion that leads to it. That the federal office for migration does not understand this is deeply upsetting and very thought provoking.  

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13.06.2014 The immigration debate and the discussion about safe countries of origin

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Hofmann (2014) focuses on the German migration policy based on the currently discussed draft bill to declare Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia to be safe countries of origin. The key point of the debate lies in the estimates of how strong the discrimination of minorities in the states in question really is. While proponents of the draft law point to neighbouring countries who also declared Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Macedonia as being safe countries of origin, refugee organizations and left-wing politicians refer to Rroma slums and repeated reports of explicit discrimination. The federal government takes the position that the situation of the Rroma in the Balkans is difficult but does not fulfil the claim of an actual persecution: “Although the economic, societal and social situation of the Roma in all three countries is “difficult” – however, “ a persecution of Roma does not take place.” Eastern Europe expert Dusan Reljic is quoted stating that in his opinion, there is no direct discrimination by the state, but an indirect exclusion through the weak economies that favour the discrimination of minorities such as the Rroma: “In societies where there is less and less to distribute, it is hardly possible for the less educated to make a living”, said Reljic. For Rom who was rejected as an asylum applicant, the return to a Southeast European country means “a catastrophe that is associated with greatest personal sacrifices.” Finding a job is possible only with great difficulty.” The European Union should therefore attach conditions to the inclusion into the association of states as the strict observance and enforcement of minority rights. As the debate shows, there are no detailed reports on the effective level of discrimination, only general estimates. This is inaccurate for a detailed assessment, if ultimately human fates depend on these political decisions.

Demir (2014) criticizes in his article about the immigration debate, that the term “poverty immigration” is used in the political discussion as a synonym to the immigration of Rroma. The immigration from the Balkans is clearly not limited to Rroma, but also includes a variety of other ethnic groups. Therefore, the term “Rroma problem” is inappropriate and ethnicizes a phenomenon that includes and encompasses much more than a single ethnic group. The complexity behind the migration movements, the structural conditions, the different ethnic groups, the various educational levels of individual migrants, the economic situations, the political values of the different actors, all these factors are lost in reductionist modes of argumentation. Simplicity is elegant, but from the viewpoint of a scientific will to truth, simplicity is very dangerous.

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13.06.2014 Tribute to the victims of the Marzahn labour camp

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On June 15th, the state association Berlin-Brandenburg of German Sinti and Rroma commemorated the victims of the Marzahn labour camp. In the 1930s, Rroma living in Berlin were brought to Marzahn labour camp after the rise of the Nazis, in order to “clean” the city for the Olympic Games of 1936: “Thousands of Gypsies were here – between the cemetery and the former sewage farms – interned and forced to work in labour camps before they were transported to concentration camps. […] In the “Gypsy camp Marzahn”, from the summer 1936 onward, at least 1,200 people from infants to elderly were held under inhuman conditions. By the spring of 1943, almost all inmates had been deported to Auschwitz. From there, almost no one came back” (Tessman 2014). The chairman of the state association, Petra Rosenberg, will remind with a speech on June the 15th that the persecution and marginalization of the Rroma continued after the end of World War II and the German government recognized these injustices only after long efforts by political activists (Tessman 2014).

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11.06.2014 Médias-Press-Info propagates criminal Rroma begging networks

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In a highly biased article, burdened with prejudice, Depauw (2014) from Médias-Press-Info writes about criminal Rroma begging networks in Brussels. All beggars, no matter in what form they appear, are said to be meticulously prepared for the role they have to “play” in front of the passers-by. The collection of funds for a fictitious organization, simulating disability or children begging with hollow hands, they are all said to be part of criminal, hierarchically organized begging networks: “All of these beggars are in reality part of well organized networks that leave nothing to change. The roles and the locations of allocation of each person are precisely planned. The heads of these networks know very well what the average income of each beggar is.” However, Depauw says nothing about the exact structure of these networks and gives no arguments on the plausibility of his own reasoning. Would he do so, the massive prejudices and value judgments in his article should strike him. He automatically makes all beggars to be Rroma, although the ethnicity of beggars is far from obvious. That there is organized begging may be the case, but its organisation, its frequency, and in particular its profitability is clearly refuted by sociological studies. The incomes from the begging are anything but high, as Tabin (2013) shows in his study regarding Lausanne. Beggars that do indeed beg because of poverty are not interesting to the editors, because they do not obey to the logic of sensationalist and investigative journalism. And yet, the journalists could benefit from a little more sense for the complexity of the world. Reality goes beyond villains and heroes.

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11.06.2014 Pope Francis calls for more respectful interaction with Rroma

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Newspapers in various languages report on the invitation of Pope Francis to greet Rroma with more respect. The Pope spoke with Rroma at a congress for pastoral care in the Vatican: “Francis criticized the discrimination against Roma and Sinti in the labour market, which often culminates in exploitation and modern slavery. Also in the educational and health care system, Sinti and Roma are disadvantaged. The Pope called for greater efforts word wide to better integrate Rroma into their countries. Members of these minorities are too often excluded from the political, economic and cultural life, he said. They would often be exploited and be forced to beg. Sinti and Roma are regarded regularly with hostility, he concluded” (Domradio 2014). Francis further criticized the lack of respect for the Rroma in Italy, which he himself had experienced. But he also urged the Rroma themselves for more efforts towards a successful integration: “The reality is complex, but surely they themselves are also called upon to contribute to the common good. And that is possible if they take responsibility, if the duties are just as respected as the rights of every individual person” (kipa 2014). Francis appeal is a valuable contribution to the development of society towards the full integration of the Rroma. However, his statement that Rroma are often forced to beg, has to be treated with caution. The idea of organized begging gangs persists, although sociological studies indicate that many beggars to so because of poverty and are not part of criminal networks. In addition, many beggars are identified as Rroma through the observer’s viewpoint, although their ethnicity is not evident. The reference to the agency of the Rroma is important, but it should not be forgotten that discrimination is often so strong that the radius of action is extremely limited (compare Davies 2014, L’Orient-Le Jour/AFP 2014, Radio Vatikan 2014, Wooden 2014).

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11.06.2014 Anti-Rroma pogroms in the Czech Republic have increased

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Maegerle (2014) reports on increased pogroms against Rroma in the Czech Republic. Of particular concern is the increasing violence against the minority that is tolerated by middle-class residents, or even supported. Maegerle states: “The current Czech extremism report suggests that actions against Roma are the biggest threat in the country. Marches and demonstrations against Roma were held in České Budějovice, Duchcov, Vítkov and Ostrava. […] Hundreds of neo-Nazis tried to start a pogrom against around 350 Roma in the town [České] of approximately 100,000 inhabitants. The attacks were accompanied by hooting and applause from the public.” The right-wing extremist scene in the Czech Republic remains dominated of the “Workers ‘Party for Social Justice” (Dělnická strana sociální Spravedlnosti – DSSS), as stated in the report cited by Maegerle. The party abuses and exploits the minority for its scapegoat politics, in which the Rroma are held responsible for all possible social ills. For the complex economic, historical, political and legal backgrounds of these grievances, for which society is responsible as a whole, the right-wing extremists shows no understanding at all. That it is very much possible to successfully integrate the Rroma is shown by Rosenzweig’s (2014) report on a small town in the Czech Bohemia.

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11.06.2014 Appleby Horse Market: positive stereotypes for once prevalent

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Several British newspapers report on the annual horse market in Appleby. Around 10,000 Rroma from all over Europe come together in Appleby to groom their horses, present and trade them. It is striking that for once, neither stealing nor begging Rroma are mentioned, but rather, positive aspects such as the attractiveness of the horses and the ritual of washing them are highlighted. However, it is also striking that travellers, Irish Travellers and Rroma are once more amalgamated, although Irish Travellers and other travelling communities are not the same as Rroma. Only a fraction of the Rroma is indeed travelling. In addition, the stereotype of Rroma as fortune-tellers is conveyed. Arkell (2014) states: “Gypsies from around Europe descended on the Eden Valley for the annual event, where traditionally travellers parade their horses before potential buyers, racing them at high speed along the ‘mad mile’ before cooling them down with a dip in the River Eden. The fair, which runs until next Wednesday, is the largest and one of the oldest of its kind anywhere in Europe, attracting 10,000 gipsies and 30,000 visitors each year. […] Gipsies come from around the world to meet friends, conduct business, and trade horses, while visitors come to admire the animals and visit the market stalls, palm readers, and fortune tellers” (compare Faratin 2014, The Northern Echo 2014, Williams 2014).  

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