‘Uno di noi’: Conflict avoidance and resolution within the Italian Sinti community

Abstract

This article explores the practice of autonomous lawmaking operating within the Italian Sinti community. More specifically, building on a case study collected during extensive ethnographic fieldwork, it proposes an analysis of the modalities of conflict avoidance, management and resolution used by those families involved in the economic niche of travelling show business. This study contributes to addressing the importance of these practices in maintaining a fair distribution of economic resources and territorial control, as well as avoiding tensions between families who recognize each other as equals in strength, values and morality. The enforcement of systems of governance that are autonomous (though not entirely disconnected) from those of the majority society, strengthens a perception of belonging to a separate community, consolidating a sense of unity in dispersion and solidarity in fragmentation. It also emphasises an ideological separation from the non-Sinti travellers who inhabit the carnival world, defining an ‘ethical’ divergence in ways of approaching the same business environment.