The Roma in Europe

Children of Cain: The Roma in Europe by Qristina Cummings is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at golden-zephyr.com.

Children of Cain –The Roma in Europe

The Roma (or Gypsy) people have been a part of the European cultural landscape for hundreds of years. However, they are still largely misunderstood and marginalized. According to historical sources the Roma initially fled Northern India to escape Muslim invasions during the Middle Ages¹ and began arriving in Europe during the early 14th century². Due to the fact that this migration was unhurried and unremarkable, it left very little documentary evidence in its wake. One of the first records of the Gypsies was written by a Franciscan monk, Symon Simeonis in 1323 on island of Crete³. Simeonis’ observations, recorded in the Itinerarium ab Hybernia ad Terram Sanctam, are thought to be among the first written documentations of the Roma. Described as “a race of people dwelling outside the city, who worship according to the Greek rite, and assert themselves to be of the race of Ham (de genere Chaym)”⁴ the gypsies were considered to be “accursed of Heaven, nomad and outcast, who after the thirtieth day wander from field to field with little, oblong, black, low tents, after the fashion of the Arabs, and from cave to cave, because the place inhabited by them becomes after the above-mentioned time full of vermin and other filth, in the presence of which it is impossible to live.”⁵

During the same period, the Roma arrived in the countries of southeastern Europe, in the Balkan Peninsula⁶ including Serbia, Bulgaria, and Romania. During the late 14th and early 15th century, the Roma were granted permits allowing them safe passage⁷ through lands owned by local rulers in Slovakia and Hungary. However, with the invasion of the Ottoman Turks, the Roma were viewed as Muslim sympathizers and new restrictions, such as policies of exclusion or banishment emerged attempting to severely limit or prohibit Romani movement⁸. These provisions led to the enslavement of Roma as soon as they entered the Romanian lands of Wallachia and Moldavia and the Ottoman Empire’s European domains. They were not fully emancipated until 1864.  According to Viorel Achim, about 250,000 Roma were emancipated at this time⁹ triggering extensive migrations throughout Europe. However, in the rest of Europe during the latter part of the 19th century, the “Roma were often forcibly separated from the rest of the population so that their activities could be watched and controlled”¹⁰ adding to their stigma and destitution. This ethnocentric viewpoint was brought to its inevitable conclusion during the turmoil of the World Wars.

In 1906 the Prussian government furthered its oppressive clampdown on Romani movement and issued a decree, “Combating the Gypsy Nuisance,”¹¹ which was aimed at linking already existing anti-Romani agreements throughout Europe. Subsequent legal measures continued the direct discrimination against Roma populations and were extremely damaging. Following World War I, efforts against the Roma were intensified and by the time Adolf Hitler rose to power in 1933, officials had the authority to force Roma to leave Germany “… and to sterilize German Roma.”¹² However, these measures were not strict enough to satisfy Nazi Germany and in 1935, Minister of the Interior Wilhelm Frick declared that “Gypsies, Negroes, and their bastards” were to be considered “pollutants of Aryan blood.”¹³

After the outbreak of World War II Nazi states placed large numbers of Roma in forced labor and concentration camps. Many thousands of Roma died in the poorly documented Porrajmos (Romani Holocaust). In the post-war 1950’s life did not immediately improve for the remaining Roma populations. For example, Czechoslovak law claimed that “a nomadic life is lead by someone who, whether in a group or individually, wanders from place to place and avoids honest work or makes his living in a disreputable way”¹⁴ and it wasn’t until after the death of Stalin in 1953, that Roma began to reclaim their ethnic identity, though they did not receive official recognition as an ethnic minority until 1980. Following the collapse of Communism in 1989 and the subsequent dissolution of Eastern Bloc countries, the emergence of new states in Europe urged fresh inquiry regarding nationality, identity, and statehood¹⁵. Although new lines of belonging, exclusion and “definitions of citizens, foreigners and entitlements based on ethnicity and language”¹⁶ were drawn up they were not done so in a way beneficial to the minority Roma.

The Roma are considered “one of the oldest cultural communities of Europe”¹⁷ and although the exact roots of the Roma are not known¹⁸ research has shown that they most likely migrated from the Punjabi region of India. This history is supported by tracing both the linguistic and genetic record of Roma groups through Europe back to the group of Upper Paleolithic people who migrated southwards and whose specific genetic mutation “is not found in appreciable frequencies outside of India and forms a uniquely Indian substratum.”¹⁹ In fact, studies have shown a common ancestor “of all Gypsies regardless of declared group identity, country of residence and rules of endogamy.”²⁰ Based on further genetic testing, this common Roma ancestor is believed to have lived approximately forty generations ago, which explicitly links the exodus from India and subsequent excursion into Europe to a “single recent founding event.”²¹

The nomadic Roma lifestyle and cultural expectations which have aided in maintaining this genetic lineage have also preserved much of the Roma culture, language, music, and dance. According to Nadia Hava-Robbins, a Romani activist and dancer, “because the Romani people have been so widely misunderstood, ostracized, oppressed, discriminated against, and were subject to attempted extermination by Hitler, they keep their culture closely guarded within their own family/social structure, passing it from generation to generation over a millennium until today.”²² In fact, the primary method of survival for the Roma has been invisibility, allowing them to “maintain an impressive degree of cultural integrity, not only by absolutely excluding [non-Gypsies] from their private lives, their law, their personal practices, and their values, but by excluding them even from knowledge about Romani language and social institutions.”²³

One strong factor behind the continued exclusion of the Roma populations from the surrounding culture is the Romaniya (or marimé) code. This legal code details strict ideas of pollution and purity, ideas which on the surface make no sense to the outside observer. For example, “the rule that the presence of women on higher floors of a house pollutes the occupants of lower floors appears to be irrational.”²⁴ These ‘social taboos’ may have the benefit of warding off any further inquiries and maintaining exclusion from the dominant group and even if these rules are deemed irrational, “their binding force is perceived to be tied not to human reasoning, but to divine forces.”²⁵ In fact, Romaniya is strongly based in ancient folk religion going back to Indian sources, and any attempts to explain it “contain the seeds of doubt.”²⁶ Within this “folk religion with a veneer of Christianity, the patriarchs are the de facto religious leaders.”²⁷ The Christian aspects of Roma beliefs have, for the most part, been adopted from the host-culture religion. In more recent years, this syncretic belief structure has led to the rise of ‘Christian Gypsies’. In fact, a strong “Pentecostal movement among the Rom appeared in the 1960s in France,”²⁸ where it was initially appealing as it gave the Rom freedom to travel (albeit to religious rallies) without routine harassment from the authorities. However, it is interesting to note that “It’s not unusual for a charismatic Romani leader to offer religion as a salve for suffering”²⁹ and researchers have traced a pattern of Evangelical and Pentecostal conversion spanning most of Europe since the 1950s.

Yet, despite the recent adoption of these ‘new’ religions, the majority of Roma groups still maintain a strict adherence to the old Romaniya ways and cultural norms governing marriage, birth, death, and life. Yet, since most groups are still extremely wary of outside interference (oppression, abuse, and extradition are still widespread), little accurate information is available regarding the origins, maintenance, and frequency of folk songs, stories, and dances.

However, according to many scholars, Roma peoples hold a unique place among the world’s ethnic minorities. This uniqueness “lies in the fact that they are a transnational, non-territorially based people who do not have a ‘home state’ to provide a haven or extend protection to them.”³⁰ While there are certainly other groups that are transnational in nature, such as the Kurds, the Roma are the largest distinct group who maintain a lack of any territorial affiliation. This exceptional situation to some degree explains their marginality and the relationship to the states and societies of Europe, in fact, “Romani marginality is far more comprehensive than that of the Jews, Kurds, or other traditionally excluded or disadvantaged groups.”³¹ For the most part, Roma have not formed an integral part of any of the societies in which they have traditionally lived and have maintained sufficiently distinctive “history, traditions, culture, language, and appearance”³² that integration or assimilation as been fraught with seemingly insurmountable problems.

Historically, the states of Europe have “failed to formulate realistic approaches to national integration”³³ and have provided only two choices to minority groups: total assimilation or total rejection and marginality. Distinctly different Roma populations have been “linked together pejoratively under the term gypsies, alongside ethnically unrelated groups”³⁴ and despite the fall of Communist regimes in 1989, have often been subjected to increasingly hostile and exclusive policies. For example, in the Czech Republic the eruption of anti-Romani sentiment post-1989 was even greater than during the preceding years. This active exclusion and marginalization of Roma “included a vibrant anti-Romani skinhead movement, vicious killings which went unpunished, coercive sterilization practices unchecked by any authority, systemic racial discrimination in a range of areas, regular anti-Romani pronouncements by high-ranking Czech officials, and a widespread view that Roma deserved abuse.”³⁵

Negative stereotypes associated with the term Gypsy have in part been to blame for the consistently damaging view of Roma populations. According to journalist Walter Lippmann who coined the term, a stereotype is a “picture in our heads.”³⁶ Lippmann also contended that our imagination is shaped by the pictures seen; “consequently, they lead to stereotypes that are hard to shake.”³⁷ Not only that but, “Our identity is partly shaped by recognition or its absence, often by the misrecognition of others, and so a person or a group of people can suffer real damage, real distortion, if society mirrors back to them a confining or demeaning picture of themselves.”³⁸ For example, the stereotype of the Gypsy is one of “excessively poor, often itinerant, ignorant and under-educated, disenfranchised politically and marginalized economically, socially excluded and culturally appreciated in a very narrow context.”³⁹ However, by continued resistance to assimilation and integration, and by tenacious preservation of a distinctive identity, the Roma have only perpetuated this stereotype.⁴⁰ In Eastern Europe, and elsewhere, the Roma have consistently been surrounded by a hostile social environment which has led to the fierce preservation of their separate identities. The Romani culture and resistance to assimilation is at once “the curse and salvation”⁴¹ of its people. As William McCagg noted, “the Gypsies, for all the abuses of them, and for all their poverty, are still free.”⁴² Paradoxically, the social and educational policies that European regimes firmly regulated, contributed to the development of what they feared most: the formation of an actively distinct Romani identity and a vibrant anti-assimilation movement.

Today it is estimated that over ten million Roma live in Europe, with a large percentage of them residing within the European Union. The continued “anti-Romani hostility, violence, and systemic discrimination”⁴³ has increasingly brought the inclusion of Roma within society into the realms of European Policy making. Roma minority status has often influenced the position of majority states. For example, when hundreds of Roma from fled violent oppression in Hungary in 2000 and sought asylum in France “questions were raised as to Hungary’s readiness for free movement.”⁴⁴

Even today, the discrimination and deportation of Roma continues, with forcible expulsion of Roma populations from many European countries such as the United Kingdom and France. As recently as September 2010, French president Nicolas Sarkozy accused Roma “of turning to crime, prostitution, and exploitation of children”⁴⁵ and has refused to cease its dismantling of Roma camps despite strong opposition from the European Commission which stated that the “mass expulsions amounted to discrimination on the basis of race and ethnicity.”⁴⁶ Despite continual urges to integrate Roma, many still live in extreme poverty and suffer continued discrimination, violence, and forced deportations.

A 2009 study by The Swedish National Board for Youth Affairs showed that one of the main problems with integration and inclusion of Roma is “that the present level of knowledge and research on the situation of Roma people in general, and young people in particular, is limited.”⁴⁷ This is, in part, due to the self-exclusion policies that Roma people maintain, which is in turn due to the harsh discrimination they have faced over the centuries. Another problem is the continued maintenance of laws in European countries, which directly or indirectly target the Roma population. For example, in Turkey Roma who are considered foreign or without nationality can be deported immediately⁴⁸ and since most Roma are still regard as nomadic (and therefore stateless) they are at elevated risk for expatriation. Another problem is the practice of granting Roma ‘temporary’ immigration status, for example, “Romany families were given asylum in Germany in the aftermath of the war in Kosovo in the late 1990s, but only with so-called ‘toleration’ status.”⁴⁹ This means that once German authorities decide that Kosovo is safe the Roma must immediately return⁵⁰. Unfortunately, that ‘return’ is often involuntary and is back to a country where economic and social stigma remains high. José Manuel Fresno, Adviser for Ethnic Minorities in the European Union and President of Spain’s Council for Equal Treatment and Non-discrimination believes that “France, Italy, Romania, Bulgaria, indeed all EU member states, have the means to achieve the social integration of the Roma community.”⁵¹ However, “despite the formal recognition of minority rights in post-communist legislation, central governments and local administrations in most CEE countries failed to promote the social integration of Roma. This lack of political commitment prepared the ground for the worsening living conditions and popular rejection of Roma.”⁵² Another alarming trend in many European countries is the severe lack of education and support for Roma children. Of the few Roma children who attend school most are placed in ‘remedial’ or ‘special schools’. For example, “data for the Czech Republic suggests that between 75 and 85 percent of Roma children are enrolled in remedial special schools”⁵³. The situation is discouragingly similar in other European countries. “Estimates cited in country reports put the share of Roma in special schools in Slovakia at 80 percent, Macedonia at 60–70 percent, 80 percent in Montenegro, and 50–80 percent in Serbia.”⁵⁴

These and other exclusion policies do nothing to aid the plight of Roma populations, in fact activists report that the Roma, who are extremely disenfranchised and lacking of even the most basic necessities “are suffering from attacks and discrimination across Europe at a time when people are seeking scapegoats for the continent’s economic difficulties.”⁵⁵ At a 2010 conference, Laszlo Andor, the European Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs stated that “the EU cannot solve the multi-layered problems of the Roma by itself. The European Union is ready to step up its efforts for Roma integration, but that is also what we expect from all member states,”⁵⁶ and even though the European Union has funds available, states routinely withhold the money.

The future of the Roma is still deeply uncertain. There are vast discrepancies between the Roma and host country populations. For example, the vast majority of the Roma population are functionally illiterate, with only a meager eight percent finishing secondary school and virtually no enrollment in higher education⁵⁷ Not only that, but “two out of three [Roma] children live below the poverty level. One out of three lives in extreme poverty. That is, below the hunger line – not enough money to even buy food for your basic calorie intake.”⁵⁸ Therefore, rudimentary community programs providing nutritional support, education, and economic opportunities are of vast importance, as well as the removal of discriminatory and prohibitive laws. According to José Manuel Fresno, “the challenge, highlighted by recent events in France, is not merely the social integration of Roma and other vulnerable groups but giving substance to the ideals of social justice, democratic maturity and equality before the law that underlies the construction of the European Union.”⁵⁹

References

• Achim, Viorel. The Roma in Romanian History. Budapest: Central European UP, 2004. Print.
• “BBC News – Home.” BBC – Homepage. 10 Sept. 2010. Web. 14 Sept. 2010.<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/>.
• Barany, Zoltan D. The East European Gypsies: Regime Change, Marginality, and Ethnopolitics. Cambridge University Press, 2002.
  —. “Living on the Edge: The East European Roma in Postcommunist Politics and Societies.” Slavic Review Summer 53.2, 1994: 321-44
• Bos, Stefan J. “Hungarian Roma Face Uncertain Future.” Deutsche Welle, May 18, 2010. http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5583163,00.html.
• Cahn, C. & Guild, E. Recent Migration of Roma in Europe OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorites Study, Dec. 2008.
• Cahn, Claude. “The Unseen Powers: Perception, Stigma and Roma Rights.” Roma Rights Quarterly 3, 2007.
• Crowe, D. M. International and Historical Dimensions of Romani Migration in Central and Eastern Europe Nationalities Papers, Vol. 31, No.1, 2003.
• Esposito, Mario. “The Pilgrimage of Symon Semeonis: A Contribution to the History of Mediæval Travel.” The Geographical Journal 50.5 (1917): 335-52.
• Etxeberria, Felix. “Education and Roma Children in the Basque Region of Spain.” Intercultural Education 13.3 (2002): 291-304.
• “EU Searches for Answers in Roma Integration Debate.” Decade of Roma Inclusion: News 11-12 (December 3, 2010).
• Fresno, Jose M. “No Social Justice Possible without Roma Inclusion.” Alliance 15, no. 4 (December 2010).
• Hava-Robbins, Nadia. “Romani Dance Article.” Romani.org Home Page. Web. 11 Nov. 2010. <http://romani.org/roma_dance_art.html>.
• Jordan, Michael J., and Shejla Fidani. 2010. “Macedonia’s Romani Imam.” Transitions Online 6. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed November 11, 2010).
• Kalaydjieva, Luba, Bharti Morar, Raphaelle Chaix, and Hua Tang. “A Newly Discovered Founder Population: the Roma/Gypsies.” BioEssays 27.10, 2005: 1084-094
• Knight, Ben. “New UNICEF Report Condemns German Policy of Deporting Roma Children.”Deutsche Welle, July 8, 2010. Accessed December 16, 2010. http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5775224,00.html.
• Lee, Ronald. “The Rom-Vlach Gypsies and the Kris Romani.” Gypsy Law: Romani Legal Traditions and Culture. Berkeley: University of California, 2001
• Lippmann, Walter. 1992; Public Opinion. Available at: http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/6456.
• Marc, Alexandre. “Intercultural Education and the Situation of the Roma.” Expert Meeting on Intercultural Education Rep. Paris: UNESCO, 2006. ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED498574.
• Marsh, Adrian. “Research and the Many Representations of Roma Identity” Roma Rights quarterly 3, 2007.
• McCagg, William O. Gypsy Policy in Socialist Hungary and Czechoslovakia 1945-1989” Nationalities Papers, 19, no.3, 1991.
• McDonald, Christina, Katy Negrin, and Milena Mihajlović. Roma Children in “special Education” in Serbia: Overrepresentation, Underachievement, and Impact on Life. Report. Budapest: Open Society Institute, 2010.
• Roma and Sinti. Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights. The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. Web. 28 Oct. 2010.
• Sullivan, Shannon. Revealing Whiteness: the Unconscious Habits of Racial Privilege. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2006. Print.
• Taylor, Charles 1992. Multiculturalism and the Politics of Recognition Princeton University Press.
• “The Situation of Young Roma People – Education, Work and the Future.” Ungdomsstyrelsen. Accessed December 16, 2010. http://www.ungdomsstyrelsen.se/english_art/0,2683,8101,00.html.
• Timur, Şafak. “Roma Eye Future with Hope, Unease.” Hürriyet Daily News (Istanbul), January 20, 2010.
• Wells, Spencer. The Journey of Man: a Genetic Odyssey. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2002.
• Weyrauch, Walter O. Gypsy Law: Romani Legal Traditions and Culture. Berkeley: University of California, 2001

1. Crowe, D. M [↩]
2. Cahn, C. & Guild, E [↩]
3. Achim, Viorel [↩]
4. Esposito, Mario [↩]
5. Ibid., [↩]
6. Achim, Viorel [↩]
7. Crowe, D. M [↩]
8. Crowe, D. M [↩]
9. Crowe, D. M [↩]
10. Sullivan, Shannon [↩]
11. Crowe, D. M [↩]
12. Ibid., [↩]
13. Crowe, D. M. [↩]
14. Sullivan, Shannon [↩]
15. Cahn, C. & Guild, E [↩]
16. Ibid., [↩]
17. Marc, Alexandre [↩]
18. Etxeberria, Felix [↩]
19. Wells, Spencer [↩]
20. Kalaydjieva, Luba, Bharti Morar, Raphaelle Chaix, and Hua Tang. [↩]
21. Ibid., [↩]
22. Hava-Robbins, Nadia [↩]
23. Weyrauch, Walter O. [↩]
24. Ibid., [↩]
25. Weyrauch, Walter O [↩]
26. Ibid., [↩]
27. Lee, Ronald [↩]
28. Ibid., [↩]
29. Jordan, Michael J. [↩]
30. Barany, Zoltan D. [↩]
31. Ibid., [↩]
32. Barany, Zoltan D. [↩]
33. Ibid., [↩]
34. Roma and Sinti. Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights. [↩]
35. Cahn, Claude. [↩]
36. Lippmann, Walter. [↩]
37. Ibid., [↩]
38. Taylor, Charles [↩]
39. Marsh, Adrian. [↩]
40. Barany, Zoltan D [↩]
41. McCagg, William O. [↩]
42. Ibid., [↩]
43. Ibid., [↩]
44. Ibid., [↩]
45. BBC News [↩]
46. Ibid., [↩]
47. The Situation of Young Roma People [↩]
48. Timur, Şafak. [↩]
49. Knight, Ben. [↩]
50. Ibid., [↩]
51. Fresno, Jose M. [↩]
52. Ibid., [↩]
53. McDonald, Christina, Katy Negrin, and Milena Mihajlović. [↩]
54. Ibid., [↩]
55. Bos, Stefan J. [↩]
56. Decade of Roma Inclusion: News 11-12 [↩]
57. Ibid., [↩]
58. Knight, Ben. [↩]
59. Fresno, Jose M. [↩]