National Roma Integration Strategies Research Articles

Gender Sensitivity in the National Roma Integration Strategies of Member States of the European Union

Abstract A large part of the European Roma community faces prejudices, discrimination, and social exclusion. This situation is more visible in Roma women. This study assesses gender sensitivity in the National Roma Integration Strategies (NRIS) of the Member States of the European Union. To do so, an adapted ad hoc tool was applied to the twenty-seven NRIS documents, making it possible to identify gender sensitivity in its “symbolic dimension”—declaration of principles and values that guide the action and/or proposing reasons of the intervention; and in its “operational dimension”—formal aspects of the intervention. In addition, this tool allowed us to classify the documents according to their gender approach. A low gender sensitivity is observed, which is more developed in the symbolic part. The line of action with greater gender sensitivity is health, followed by employment and education. Gender sensitivity is nonexistent for housing.

Roma heteroidentification in the National Roma Integration Strategies of the European Union countries

As part of the EU’s social policy, the National Roma Integration Strategies (NRIS) have been in force until 2020. It was a pending task to systematically observe how these strategies define the Roma population and what element of the definition is prioritised. This is useful in understanding the limits of a unitary policy within the European Union concerning the Roma and also to analyse the orientation of said policies in each country. In this sense, we have previously defined what the Roma heteroidentification components are and we have selected the terms and lexemes that are associated with them. By using content analysis techniques, we have pinpointed the components in the NRIS and we have conducted a statistical analysis with the obtained data. The majority of EU countries define the Roma in their strategies as an ethnocultural, disadvantaged and discriminated group and, to a lesser extent, as foreigners or nomads. This heteroidentification is established based on the geopolitical bloc (East and West) to which the country belongs and the department in charge of the NRIS (mainly social departments or specific departments for minorities).

Introduction: beyond nation states?

ABSTRACT The Roma, as Europe’s largest minority group and who experience disproportionate levels of poverty, unemployment, poor accommodation and social exclusion have received significant political and policy-related attention in recent years. In 2011 the European Parliament announced the EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies (NRIS) which marked the first EU wide effort to address Roma poverty and marginalisation via national strategies devised at the national level. Each member state has produced national strategies for Roma inclusion in the core areas of education, housing, health, employment and discrimination with a focus on integrated inclusion, e.g., recognising that inclusion in one sphere requires inclusion in the others. In 2017 the European Commission published its mid-term review of the EU Framework which examines the progress made in each member state. The series of articles in this special edition addresses the progress made in meeting the NRIS’s objectives in seven member states each providing an in depth and critically informed analysis of policy development, progress and limitations in each country. The introduction provides a historical and policy context of the NRIS and considers its implications for the social integration and citizenship rights of Roma people.

Health indicators of the National Roma Integration Strategy in Spain in the years 2006 and 2014.

In 2011, the European Commission adopted the European framework for the National Roma Integration Strategies (NRISs) 2020, which focussed on four areas: education, employment, health and housing. In 2012 Spain approved its Strategy 2012-20, one of the central aims of which is to reduce social inequalities in health that affect the Roma population. Our objective was to analyze changes in health inequalities between the Roma population and the general population in Spain in the years 2006 and 2014. The Spanish National Health Surveys (NHSs) 2006 (n = 29478) and 2012 (n = 20 884) and the NHS of the Spanish Roma Population 2006 (n = 933) and 2014 (n = 1155) were compared. This study considered the variables included in NRIS 2012-20: self-perceived health, tobacco use in men, traffic accidents in men and women, obesity in women and gynaecological visits. Despite the adoption of the NRIS 2012-20, there were no observed improvements in health between 2006 and 2014 in the Roma population. Nor was there a reduction in inequalities in health concerning the general population in Spain. Also, there was no reduction in the health inequalities by gender for the two populations. Health is determined in part by social factors including education, employment, housing and also by anti-Roma discourses and discrimination. Improving the health of the Roma population requires a multi-sectoral approach with a gender perspective.

Public policies for Roma during postsocialism: between Europeanization and devolution of responsibilities

In this study I will focus on the main institutional developments and public and social policies that were developed during postsocialism in the field of (ethnic) minority protection and the improvement of the socio-economic well-being of Roma in Romania. In the first decade of postsocialism, efforts were rather headed towards cultural and political rights, and the interventions came from non-governmental organizations. After 2001, the first coherent public policy to address the Roma was developed for a period of 10 years (revised in 2006) and aimed to reduce the gaps between Roma and non-Roma in four areas: education, health, housing and employment. The Roma strategy pinpointed the institutional responsibilities at central and local level for its implementation and created positions within the prefectures, ministries and mayoralties, responsible for monitoring the implementation of the strategy. In the last part of the chapter I will discuss the development of policies and initiatives for Roma at European level, starting with the 1990s, when the European institutions had no instruments aimed at the protection of minorities and until present days when an European Union Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies was developed.

Strategizing roma identity for India-EU collaboration: strengthening the NRIS

It is an established observation that the Roma have been one of the world’s most impoverished, persecuted and marginalized communities, yet also the least understood. While there have been some estimates of a global Roma population of 20 million, these communities are dispersed throughout several countries in Europe, Asia and the Americas. This article concerns the European Roma and the issues which engage them, the most salient being identity. It seeks to find congruence between the socioeconomic empowerment processes of Dalit (oppressed) communities in India with those of the Roma. There is a historical connection between the Romani language groups and north Indian languages – indeed it is from India where Roma communities are known to have originally migrated from. This article argues for the value of reviving these links by turning the argument around and advocating that aspects of the contemporary Indian experience of socioeconomic empowerment could be applied to Roma empowerment in Europe within the framework of the EU’s National Roma Integration Strategies (NRIS). This could benefit India through interaction with the Global Roma Diaspora and lead to a win-win situation whereby India would equally obtain advantage from learning about EU-centered models of inclusion. Accordingly, the robust sharing of good practices could benefit both sides.

The ‘thin’ and ‘thick’ needs of Roma: a participatory mixed methods study

ABSTRACTThis article contributes to scholarship on participatory mixed methods research while and presents empirical evidence relating to the needs of Roma. The European Commission against Racism and Intolerance (2005) acknowledged the specific nature of racism towards Roma as being persistent both historically and geographically; permanent and not decreasing; as systematic, accepted by virtually all the community; and often accompanied by acts of violence [2012, National Roma Integration Strategies: a first step in the implementation of the EU Framework. COM (2012) 226, 21 May 2012, http://ec.europa.eu/justice/discrimination/roma/eu-framework/index_en.htm]. This has repercussions for establishing trust in the research relationship. Thus, such research presents a methodological challenge which on this occasion could not have been completed without the active involvement of community researchers at every stage of the research process. Its aim was to assess the needs of Roma in a particular time and place. Scholarship on needs influenced the methodology and a participatory sequential explanatory mixed methods study was designed and completed. Nancy Fraser distinguishes between ‘thin needs’, which refer to universal needs, and ‘thick needs’, which are more specific [1989, Unruly Practices, Cambridge: Polity Press, p. 163]. This framework is utilized to explore the accommodation needs of Roma in Ireland.

‘Non multa, sed multum’: EU Roma policy and the challenges of Roma inclusion

The Roma face widespread discrimination and marginalisation in the EU. To address these, the Commission adopted an EU Roma policy—‘EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies’ (2011)—which is implemented with the support of EU legal, financial and soft law instruments. This paper investigates the effectiveness and implications of EU Roma policy in addressing the social exclusion and discrimination faced by the Roma by assessing the policy framing, the key EU instruments and whether they address the root causes of Roma marginalisation. It is argued that the socio-economic framing of Roma exclusion—underpinning the EU Roma policy—along with the EU instruments upholding its implementation, both blurred the responsibility boundaries for Roma inclusion between the EU and national levels, and also proved ineffective and ill-designed in addressing the root causes of Roma exclusion and discrimination.

Taking stock of Roma health policies in Spain: Lessons for health governance

Roma health inequities are a wicked problem. Despite concerted efforts to reduce them under the Decade of Roma Inclusion initiative, the health gap between Roma and non-Roma populations in Europe persists. To address this problem, the European Commission devised the National Roma Integration Strategies (NRIS). This paper provides a critical assessment of the implementation of the NRIS’ health strand (NRIS-H) in Spain and proposes an evaluation tool to monitor Roma health policies – the Roma Health Integration Policy Index (RHIPEX). It also makes recommendations to promote Roma health governance. To achieve these goals, four community forums, 33 stakeholder interviews and a scoping review were conducted.Results show that the NRIS-H implementation is hindered by lack of political commitment and poor resource allocation. This has a negative impact on Roma’s entitlement to healthcare and on their participation in decision-making processes, jeopardising the elimination of the barriers that undermine their access to healthcare and potentially contributing to reproduce inequalities. These unintended effects point out the need to rethink Roma health governance by strengthening intersectional and intersectoral policies, enabling transformative Roma participation in policymaking and guaranteeing shared socio-political responsibility and accountability.

Roma and a Social Europe: the role of redistribution, intervention and emancipatory politics

The article explores what impact the concept of a Social Europe might have on Europe's Roma and how economic intervention and redistribution might alleviate Roma poverty and diminish Anti-Gypsyism. The article also makes the case for new deliberative forms of democracy being developed in tandem with social justice orientated policy through a renewed EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies. A version of this paper was presented in a keynote speech to the Council of Europe's fourth Dialogue with Roma and Traveller Civil Society in Strasbourg in September 2017.

A Means to an End or an End in Itself? EU Roma Policy, Human Rights and the Economic Investment Myth

AbstractThe Roma face a dire socio‐economic situation and structural discrimination across Europe. To address the challenges experienced by this community, the EU adopted a specific EU Roma policy – the ‘EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies’ (2011) – which, together with EU funds, supports Member States with integration of the Roma at the national level. This article argues that the economic framing of the EU Roma policy is underpinned by an economic investment myth: namely, that the EU can only address rights violations as a means to achieving the EU's economic ends. It is shown that this myth undermines the EU's legal and constitutional human rights commitments post‐Lisbon, according to which the EU has now the legal capability – but lacks the political will – to tackle rights violations such as discrimination in a manner that is not linked to the functioning of the common market.

Biased Elites, Unfit Policies: Reflections on the Lacunae of Roma Integration Strategies

In this article, I argue that policymakers employed unconscious biases and racist beliefs in the formulation and the implementation of the current EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies (ʻEU Roma Frameworkʼ) and its corresponding national strategies. Using Critical Race Theory, I explore how these policies have reinforced the commonly held belief in the need to civilize and otherwise change the habits of the Roma, and consequently have further reinforced the power imbalance between the Roma and the dominant majority groups (hereinafter used interchangeably with ʻnon-Romaʼ). I analyse examples of Roma versus universal policies comparatively, emphasizing biases in formulation, implementation, and discourse. I show that the objectives of the EU Roma Framework and national Roma strategies toward Roma education involve ethnic presuppositions and are far less ambitious than the avowed Europe 2020 strategy; this policy mismatch will likely lead to further educational discrepancies post-2020. Finally, I conclude that policies focused on the Roma are doomed to fail if no prior and concurrent actions are taken to change prejudiced attitudes and the behaviours of non-Roma, in particular those biases influencing policy formulation and implementation.

Die Inklusionsstrategie der EU gegenüber den Roma am Beispiel der Tschechischen Republik

In 2011, the European Commission adopted the <italic>Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies up to 2020</italic> which was a reaction to the failure of similar national strategies of its member countries and continuing discrimination and segregation of Roma in these countries. The main objectives of the European strategy are to combat discrimination and to ensure social and economic inclusion of Roma into the majority society. The main aim of the article is to give an overview of the cooperation between the European Union and its member states on the issue of Roma integration. To be more concrete, such kind of cooperation is analysed more thoroughly on the example of the Czech Republic, for which the inclusion of Roma is one of the most important tasks of its social development goals. Moreover, this country has been several times criticised by the European Union for its insufficient endeavour regarding the integration of Roma. The National Roma Integration Strategy by 2020 is aimed to improve the situation of Roma especially in the subjects of housing, health care, work and education. However, this strategy is also criticised by national NGOs from the point of view of both financial and institutional support.

Beyond Inclusion: Reconsidering Policies, Curriculum, and Pedagogy for Roma Students

This paper investigates the policies and politics of including European Roma students in mainstream educational systems within the context of two European Union (EU) policies: the Decade of Roma Inclusion (2005-2015) and EU National Roma Integration Strategies (2013-2020). Drawing on the scholarship about inclusion and its practical achievements, we examine the tensions between policy planning and policy implementation. We conclude that there is a discrepancy between what inclusion represents in current educational discourse and how inclusive efforts are working (or not) for Roma students.

Roma Identity as an Expert-Political Construction

The creation of an EU Framework for national Roma integration strategies (2011) marks a significant step in the politicisation of Roma identity by ensuring a further increase in the number of initiatives, projects and programmes explicitly targeting Roma. The Framework itself is part of a process that began with postcommunist transition and which has produced historically unprecedented levels of Roma political activism along with a proliferation of national and transnational policy initiatives focussed on Roma identity. In seeking to explain this contemporary political phenomenon, the article argues that Roma is an identity constructed at the intersection of political and expert knowledge by various actors, such as policymakers, Romani activists, international organizations and scholars. This political-expert identity is applied to groups that are not bounded by a common language, religion, cultural practice, geographic location, occupation, physical appearance or lifestyle. The article explores how this collation of disparate populations into a notional political community builds upon a centuries-old Gypsy legacy. It scrutinizes five strands of identification practices that have contributed to the longue durée development of today’s Roma as an epistemic object and policy target: police profiling of particular communities; administrative surveys; Romani activism; Roma targeted policies; quantitative scientific research. The article argues that the contemporary economic and political conditions amidst which the politicisation of Roma identity is occurring explain how the ideological and institutional construction of the ethnic frame tends toward the reinforcement of the exclusion of those categorised as Roma, thus increasing the perceived need for Roma policy initiatives. A self-sustaining cycle has been created where Roma knowledge identifies Roma problems requiring a policy response, which produces more Roma knowledge, more needs and more policy responses. Yet, there are consequences to racialising public discourse by presenting Roma as both problematic and essentially different from everyone else. Hostility towards Roma has increased in many states indicating that the expert framing of Roma groupness affects social solidarity by disconnecting and distancing Roma from their fellow citizens.

Challenging the school segregation of Roma children in Central and Eastern Europe

Over a decade after the application of DH and Others v. Czech Republic to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), school segregation of Roma children remains a widespread phenomenon. The issue has recently been highlighted by the 2011 European Union Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies, which has brought Roma rights issues into the social agenda of the European Union (EU). This article analyses the reasons behind the lack of progress, critically examines the case law of the ECtHR on school segregation and explores the possibility of litigation under the EU Race Equality Directive. The author argues that ECtHR judgments must be more explicit and precise in condemning school segregation as a serious form of racial discrimination in order to exert pressure for change on the ground. It is also suggested that litigation on the basis of the Race Equality Directive may offer a better course of action than the European Convention on Human Rights in certain circumstances. The article reminds that progress on the issue also requires political impetus and positive measures and, in this respect, welcomes the recent policy developments and robust attitude demonstrated by EU institutions in respect of the 2011 framework.

Feasibility of applying the Indian Dalit (underprivileged) empowerment and poverty alleviation models to the roma situation in Central and Eastern Europe

Given the historical and cultural links, linguistic and genetic affiliations, proven as well as otherwise, the aim of this paper is to explore socio-economic similarities between the marginalized classes (Gypsies or nomadic tribes in the case of India) and Roma in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). In doing so, the paper will focus on transferability of the ‘affirmative action’ model of India to address poverty, disempowerment and lack of integration of the Roma in CEE societies and lay down postulates for possible application for policy makers to work towards development and socio-economic integration of Roma communities. In this context, the EU- Roma framework and the national Roma integration strategies needs to be critically assessed to analyze fault lines in the governing model and prescribe a way forward. Consequent upon an acute form of marginalization of the Roma in CEE countries and their political vilifications, and with a significant lack of political representation, Roma communities are floundering for leadership and direction towards self-empowerment and better governance. The Indian model, with its well laid-out support mechanisms, could well be an option to look at seriously. This could lay a positive link between the precursors of Roma in India, the Dalits, and Roma in CEE countries.

Migrant Roma in the United Kingdom and the need to estimate population size

Within the political framework of the European Union (EU), there has been long standing recognition that the on-going exclusion of Roma represents a key challenge for human rights, justice and social inclusion agendas. By introducing a requirement for Member States to produce National Roma Integration Strategies (NRIS), the European Commission hopes that Member States will work in partnership with the EU and key stakeholders to achieve inclusion objectives in respect of housing, health, education and employment. The form and content of the United Kingdom’s (UK) NRIS submission has been criticised in a number of key areas; notably its ‘migrant blind’ approach (Craig, 2011; 2013). This article draws on recent research undertaken by the authors (Brown, Martin and Scullion, 2013), which aimed to estimate the size of the recently arrived Roma population in the UK and document some of the local level responses as a result of this migration. It provides an overview of the context giving rise to the research, and how previous population estimates have been attempted, both across the EU and in the UK. The paper considers whether conventional methodologies can be fit for purpose when attempting to assess the population size of a transnational and highly mobile ethnic group, or whether more experimental approaches might yield a fresh approach. More specifically, it examines the strengths and weaknesses of adopting a place typology approach (Lupton et al., 2011). Finally the paper looks at the publication of research about Roma populations in a highly politicised arena in the wake of ongoing national and international attention on Roma

Making Good European Citizens of the Roma: A Closer Look at the EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies

In a recent article, Sobotka and Vermeersch chart the development of EU policy-making towards the Roma. Their analysis of EU documents and policy initiatives tells a convincing tale: Since 2007, Roma have shifted from being an external issue—connected to Enlargement conditionality—to being a high-priority on the EU's internal agenda, and from being the subjects of an approach focused on minority rights to one of social inclusion. This change in emphasis towards the Roma can be viewed in the light of a wider reorientation of the European Union, in which the primarily economic language of European integration is moderated by a shift towards viewing economic growth and social cohesion as mutually conditioning and sustaining. This is reflected in the 2020 Strategy in the language of “smart, sustainable and inclusive growth,” as well as in the notion of a “social market economy” and in the proliferation of social rights at the EU level. This reorientation has primarily been viewed to date through the lens of the increased prominence given to fundamental rights protection in the post-Lisbon Union, and the conflict that this creates with the Union's traditional fundamental freedoms. However, this shift is not exhausted by the greater emphasis on fundamental rights protection; rather, the commitment to inclusive growth has been interpreted by the Commission as requiring the integration of Roma into the economic and social orders of the Member States.

A Minority within a Minority? Social Justice for Traveller and Roma Children in ECEC

This article discusses recent policy developments in Europe regarding Roma and Traveller integration and Early Childhood Provision. After a long history of oppression, Roma issues have recently become prominent on the EU policy agenda. The article discusses how these relate to developments in other areas of policy: the European children's rights agenda and the recognition that early childhood education and care is a key policy tool to combat social exclusion. It gives background information on Roma and Travellers in Europe and discusses the consequences of subsuming the various communities under one umbrella term: Roma. The EU Commission is concerned with responses from Member States to the European Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies. The article argues that in order to address Roma children's experience from a holistic perspective, social justice and equality need to be key elements of early childhood education and care provision and training. The European policy developments that frame the article are examined from a local vantage point: the experiences of Traveller and Roma children in Ireland and the Irish Preschool Education Initiative for Children from Minority Communities.