Roma and the Politics of EU Citizenship in France: Everyday Security and Resistance*

Abstract

AbstractThis article reflects on the politics of European Union citizenship – and the ethical possibilities and limitations of a cosmopolitan or ‘normative power’ EU – via an analysis of the situation of the Roma in France, which was widely mediatized in summer 2010. It argues in a first step that during this period the French government ‘securitized’ the Roma, ‘extra‐ordinarily’ casting them as collective threat and thereby justifying their deportation. The European Commission's outspoken response demanded that the French authorities refrain from discriminating against EU citizens on grounds of ethnicity; in so doing, the EU seemed to act as protector of minorities in accordance with its raison d'être as liberal peace project. However, in a second step, the article draws attention to the deportations perpetrated before these high‐profile events, highlighting that conditionality within the law pertaining to EU citizenship allowed for the securitization of Roma. Thus, in a third step, it is argued that the invocation of citizenship may be a useful but limited strategy of political resistance by and with excluded groups such as Europe's Roma. Rather, it is the inherently ambiguous nature of a multi‐level EU liberal or cosmopolitan government – and concomitant EU citizenship – which opens an important space for resistance.