‘Campi nomadi’ as sites of resistance: The experience of Romani camp dwellers in Rome

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the Romani people who live at the margins of Italian society, often in city camps that show signs of institutional abandonment, neglect and extreme decay. Every year, large amounts of public money are spent on managing these camps, whetting the appetites of various institutions, both private and public. Consequently, the Romani issue has turned into a business involving hundreds of employees in which it is very hard to know exactly how funds are actually used. However, as well as the top-down approach adopted by the Government and its agents, this study also uncovers the existence of a bottom-up opposition expressed by the Romani communities living in camps. The Romani camp dwellers have recently been described as ‘fighters’ or ‘warriors’ in the sense that they have learned to take advantage of their marginal conditions. The daily struggle to make the best of a bad situation might be interpreted as a form of resistance. Inside the camps, Romanies now occupy an in-between position, partly imposed on them by outside forces and partly the consequence of their own volition. While standing on the side of the subjugated and against a hierarchy which produces and reproduces injustice, this article examines how Romani camp dwellers have managed to exercise what remains to them of their free agency.

KEYWORDS:

• Italy
• Romani people
• ‘camps system’
• expression of agency/resistance

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. CSOs include community groups, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), labour unions, indigenous groups, charitable organizations, faith-based organizations, professional associations, and foundations (World Bank 2013). In Italian, they are commonly referred to as the ‘Terzo Settore’ (third sector).

2. A report released in 2012 by Transparency International linked Italy’s current economic crisis with administrative mismanagement. According to this study, ‘Italy’s public sector is weakest, with problems both in law and in practice including nepotism, lack of access to information and lack of oversight’ (p. 1). An important documentary entitled ‘Gli Appaltati’ (‘The Outsourced’, Buono and Riccardi 2007) in November 2007, and the 2014 police inquiry known as ‘Mafia Capitale’ (Mafia Capital), revealed the existence of relationships of connivance between associations working within the ‘camps system’ and members of the municipal administration (Pacelli 2015).

3. The occupation of containers is a very common business within camps. As reported by one of the inhabitants of the Castel Romano camp (as cited in Nozzoli 2013, para. 6), for instance, ‘as soon as a camp dweller vacates a container in the camp, disputes amongst Romanies begin, […] which can also lead to wars between rival groups’ (para. 5). As Pierucci (2014) notes, the trade and rental of containers has become a big business for a number of Romani families.

4. Casilino 900 was a Romani camp in the suburb of Casilino on the south-eastern outskirts of Rome. Immediately after the end of the Second World War, it became one of the areas occupied for decades by Italian refugees. Later on, during the economic boom of the 1960s, Rome also became the destination of immigrants from the south of Italy (Italian Romani groups included) in search of job opportunities and better living conditions. Many became ‘squatters’ in the abandoned shacks of citizens who during the 1970s and 1980s had either received council houses or found more permanent housing (Ministero del Lavoro e delle Politiche Sociali 2010). Until its closure in 2010, Casilino 900 was inhabited mainly by Romani residents. These had been migrating to Rome at different stages and most hailed from Yugoslavia.

5. Influential Romani intellectual, Guarnieri has increasingly questioned the value of the CSOs’ commitment to the Romanies. While arguing for Romani self-determination, Guarnieri is also critical of ‘certain Romani fringe groups’ he has said are basically milking the ‘system’. He is one of the promoters of the Federazione Rom e Sinti Insieme, which comprises around 20 Roma and Sinti organizations in Italy. He is founder and President of the non-profit organization, Fondazione Romani. With the goal of enhancing the condition of Romanies, Guarnieri has often presented proposals to the municipality of Rome for overcoming the ‘camps policy’ but the city council has never replied to him.

6. A number of camp dwellers interviewed revealed that they owned a house in their countries of origin. Despite that, as Ca. (a Romanian Romani) argues, ‘living in the camp is better than going back home. Life in Romania is much harder and Romanians are very racist towards us’ (personal communication, 11 April 2012). In addition, during my previous experience as a social worker in nomad camps from 2006 until 2008, it was not uncommon for these people to show me pictures of their properties. Most of my Romani informants confirmed that a number of Romani camp dwellers invest the money they earn in Italy back in their home countries.

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Riccardo Armillei

Until December 2015, Dr Riccardo Armillei worked for the UNESCO Chair team and the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation (ADI) as Associate Research Fellow. Dr Armillei’s research interests include Romani studies, citizenship and national identity, forced migrations, social justice, cross-cultural theories and practices. Dr Armillei undertook his PhD at the Swinburne Institute for Social Research, where he examined the social exclusion of Romanies in Italy. His dissertation focused particularly on the condition of those living in the so called ‘campi nomadi’ (nomad camps) and on the recent implementation of the ‘Emergenza Nomadi’ (nomad emergency). Between 2011 and 2012, Dr Armillei carried out qualitative research in Rome, where he worked for several years in the role as educator/social worker in some of the biggest Romani communities.