Questioning inclusion: Struggles against antiromaism in Europe

ABSTRACT

This text gives an account of racist actions against Roma people carried out by Belgrade authorities in spring and summer 2009 prior to and during the international sports games the ‘Belgrade Universiade 2009’ and during the Serbian presidency of the international ‘Decade of Roma Inclusion 2005–2015.’. It examines the coloniality of power within Europe through analyzing the EU's neo-liberal capitalist mechanisms, the historical patterns of racism and their contemporary presence in the EU integration and security policy, bringing them into relation with Yugoslavian wars and war ideology. The actions I will analyze are important, as they make visible the processes of discrimination and segregation in the EU and furthermore, they allow for a different development of the relation between capitalism and antiromaism. By reflecting the relation of capitalism and antiromaism we will see that the concept of ‘inclusion’ as it is promoted by the ‘Roma Decade’ is based exactly upon the exclusion of differences. Finally the text exposes the solidarity mode of resistance to the given state of things, looking at protests by Roma and anti-racist actions in arts and culture.

KEYWORDS:

• antiromaism
• Roma-Inclusion Decade
• Universiade
• EU integration
• coloniality
• Yugoslavian wars
• necropolitics
• anti-racism
• arts and culture