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Overview of the integration of Roma citizens in Spain and some transferable lessons for the EU
Abstract
Drawing on existing studies and research literature, this report provides an overview of the social integration of Roma in Spain, and briefly reviews evidence on the progress made and some effective, related policies and approaches within the areas of employment, education, housing and health. It also includes brief sections on political representation, associationism and activism as part of the processes of social integration of Roma in Spain.
... The Roma population represents the largest ethnic minority in the Spanish State, which has historically been the target of ethnically targeted policies and interventions, often motivated by racist stereotypes, repressive political interests and have had negative socio-economic and psycho-affective consequences, contributing to the reproduction of their marginalized social position (Laparra, 2009;San Román, 1994). Access to the European Union made it possible for Spain to establish the fundaments of a welfare state and for the Roma people to have a full access to general public services (Carrasco and Poblet 2019). While a growing network of NGOs offered care at the local level (Rodríguez, 2011). ...
... Dynamic growth of economic sectors that required little training, and low skills, has favoured the Roma people's access to the labour market and hence, a certain social mobility of a significant proportion of Roma families. The Spanish Roma population is a highly heterogenous one in all aspects (Carrasco & Poblet, 2019;Laparra, 2011), inner diversity is also present in local communities. There is a growing elite group, with advanced studies, integrated jobs and/or with a socioeconomic level comparable to the majority population (Bereményi, 2018;Bereményi & Carrasco, 2017;Brüggemann, 2015) of their social environment. ...
... Even so, a large part of the Roma population is among the most disadvantaged sectors in the areas of education, employment, health and housing, also taking into account the growing racism and discrimination against them (Felguerosa 2018;Carrasco and Poblet 2019 ;Foessa 2018;Hernández Pedreño, M .;García Luque, O;Gehrig, R. 2019;FSG 2016;Hojsik and Fremlova 2020). ...
This study offers a preliminary analysis of the municipal socio-cultural mediation service aimed at the Roma population of a city, and specifically seeks to understand to what extent this intervention favours the school-to-work transition (STWT) of Roma youth.
This data exploitation is part of a larger two-year-long, cross country comparative project funded by the European Commission. NGOST research project aims to analyse the public policies and institutional dynamics that condition STWT, as well as the transition experiences lived by Roma young people themselves, in three European countries: Hungary, Slovakia, Spain. This preliminary analysis will centre on the data collected in the Spanish fieldwork, and I seek answers to the two interrelated questions.
1. What are the achievements and challenges of a Roma intercultural mediation project
in a local context?
2. To what extent a Roma intercultural mediation can contribute to structural changes?
... The school's collaboration with the associative network related to the Roma people, which constitutes a valuable link between families and educational centres (Alexiadou, 2019;O'Hanlon, 2010;Simić et al., 2019), as well as the cultural knowledge of the teaching staff and management team about the ethnic group and its inclusion in the contents of the school, are also both essential protective factors in this first dimension (Botija et al., 2017;Ferrández-Ferrer et al., 2019;García Fernández, 2017;Peters, 2018). This makes Roma pupils feel recognised and respected and gives greater meaning to their participation and continuity in the different school stages (Carrasco and Poblet, 2019;O'Hanlon, 2010). ...
The situation of oppression and discrimination of Roma people is a fact that can be observed in many research studies. This is in conjunction with segregation and unequal educational conditions for Roma students, which do not seem to improve despite economic investment and specific intervention programmes. We understand that these situations are ever-present and structural in our society and that they segregate and exclude and become cultural, social and educational barriers for Roma students to successfully continue their academic careers until they reach university. The aim of this study was to understand the views of Roma students at a university in the south of Spain regarding the factors that had enabled them to overcome the initial difficulties they had faced during primary and secondary education, and which had acted as protective factors against educational exclusion. We have included quantitative data through the use of questionnaires, and qualitative data through the use of interviews. The results suggest that these factors are diverse, intersecting and are not mutually exclusive. Family and teacher support and the presence of a non-segregated environment, as well as personal motivation and self-awareness, are key factors. A relevant finding has been the flexibility of cultural reference models that have allowed them to navigate the exclusionary structures of the school.
Background
Discrimination against Roma individuals is a prevalent issue across Europe, presenting significant socio‐economic challenges. Spain, holding the highest concentration of Roma in Western Europe, serves as a focal point for investigating such disparities.
Objectives
This study aims to explore the wage gap between the Roma and non‐Roma populations in Spain, assessing the extent to which this disparity may be attributed to potential discriminatory practices. The objective is to provide a detailed analysis of wage inequalities to inform more effective anti‐discrimination policies.
Methods
The analysis utilizes data from the 2018 Survey on Social Integration and Social Needs, employing statistical and econometric techniques. This approach helps in quantifying the wage gap and in examining the factors contributing to the observed disparities between the two groups.
Results
The findings indicate a substantial wage gap between the Roma and non‐Roma populations. Approximately 43.5 percent of the wage difference remains unexplained by the standard variables included in the econometric model, suggesting that factors beyond educational and professional qualifications might contribute to these inequalities.
Conclusion
The significant unexplained portion of the wage gap likely points to the existence of ethnic discrimination by employers. This study underscores the urgent need for nuanced, targeted anti‐discrimination interventions specifically designed for the Roma community in Spain. The results advocate for policy adjustments that address these disparities at their core, ensuring equity and social integration.
Informe publicado por Barcelona Activa (Ayuntamiento de Barcelona)
Dipòsit legal: B 5550-2023
Els objectius d’aquest estudi són conèixer les estratègies formatives i ocupacionals de la joventut gitana de Barcelona, detectar les seves necessitats en aquest àmbit i identificar i analitzar les polítiques, els programes i les mesures corresponents, per tal d’orientar millor i reforçar les actuacions ocupacionals encaminades a fomentar una igualtat d’oportunitats més efectiva de la comunitat gitana en l’accés als dispositius de millora de l’ocupabilitat com a mesures de suport clau per a una posterior incorporació al mercat laboral ordinari.
L’estudi s’ha elaborat en dues fases, una primera el 2018 i la segona, a finals del 2021, arran de la covid-19, per tal d’explorar-ne l’impacte i l’evolució en relació amb els resultats observats en la primera fase, i tenint en compte els diferents eixos de desigualtat i dimensions d’interseccionalitat que es relacionen amb la situació d’etnicitat, com són el gènere, l’edat, la situació sociofamiliar, l’accés o el contacte directe amb referents d’èxit, l’extensió i el caràcter de la xarxa social, la situació laboral dels membres de la unitat familiar, o la seva formació. Es tracta d’una anàlisi per tal de conèixer millor les barreres i els mecanismes que interactuen amb l’etnicitat i poder ajustar millor les intervencions en clau d’ocupabilitat inclusiva en els programes i serveis d’ocupació.
Aquest estudi s’afegeix a la col·lecció «Quaderns de Futur del(s) Treball(s)», promoguda per Barcelona Activa amb l’objectiu de compartir coneixement entre la comunitat d’agents que treballen per una ocupació inclusiva a la ciutat.
The Roma population has been the most discriminated against throughout centuries of Portuguese society and have been victims of a ‘differential logic of racism’ that segregates them to the borderlines of society. In 2011 the EC adopted an EU Framework for Roma/Gypsies/Traveller Integration and invited member states to submit national strategies in four areas: housing, employment, education and healthcare. In Portugal, the National Strategy for Integration of Roma Communities, approved by the Council of Ministers in March 2013 encompasses those four areas and a fifth axis, under which priorities in areas such as mediation, recognition of Roma culture, anti-discrimination and gender equality were also included. This paper will outline how since implementation of the NRIS, in important areas such as housing and labour market little has been done and hundreds of Roma families are still without access to adequate housing or to labour market. Roma people continue to experience ‘everyday racism’, although the common discourse is that Roma do not want to integrate. The article will critically address the implementation and progress made with regards to the Portuguese NRIS addressing the underlying reasons for the lack of progress in these areas, while considering areas of limited progress and cautious optimism.
The thesis is a collection of articles, book chapters and working papers that investigate the experiences and the expectations of a group of Romanian Roma young people living in poverty between Madrid and a rural village in southern Romania. Their life stories seem to develop halfway between the reproduction of socio-economic inequalities and the challenge of social mobility. Based on a broader, multi-sited, collaborative ethnography, this work aims to unveil the interplay between structural constraints and individual agency that shapes the interaction between spatial, social and educational im/mobility in both transnational localities. The nexus between educational choices, housing problems and transnational mobility is considered in the broader context of both the policies for ‘Roma’ in Europe and the Spanish financial crisis.
This study (The study has been developed under the framework of an FP7 research project, RESL.Eu – Reducing Early School Leaving in Europe (Project scheme: SSH-2012-1; number: 320223).) aims to contribute to a line of research initiated at the beginning of the twenty-first century that inquired into the conditions that favoured the academic success and school continuity of Spain’s Roma youth (Abajo and Carrasco 2004) and also investigated the sociocultural impact that successful academic trajectories might have on Roma individuals, families and communities. This chapter will comparatively explore the experiences and trajectories of academic success of two sets of Roma youth that have been identified as ‘pre-Decade generation’ and ‘Decade-generation’, in relation to the changing policy contexts to which they have been exposed and in which they have been navigating through formal education: namely, before and in parallel with the development of the ambitious European agenda known as the Decade of Roma Inclusion (2005–2015) and corresponding national and local initiatives undertaken in Spain. Data of the first dataset were collected in 2002/2003, while those of the second set in 2015. For this analysis we have selected a total of 16 interviews. Data analysis will call for a wider framework including recent critical revisits of Ogbu’s cultural ecological theory in the context of urban schooling, but developing a success perspective that draws from literature on different forms of social and cultural capital, minority youth and education. We will firstly inquire into how social capital is operating in the family and ethnic community, in peer relations and with regards to institutional agents, including the case of ethnically targeted interventions. Secondly, we aim to identify what sociocultural changes are triggered by school success.
The 2004 and 2007 EU Eastern enlargements facilitated the mobility of citizens from CEE countries, including European citizens of Roma ethnicity, which in turn contributed to the Europeanization of the 'Roma issue'. This article examines the politics of Roma ethnicity by giving a concise, yet we hope comprehensive, overview of how recent Roma migrations from EU Member States (particularly from Romania) to Spain can be understood and analysed in relation to both pre-existing policies for the Spanish Gitano communities and to wider European dynamics and structures.
During the past decade, Gitano students’ school success and its cultural, social and emotional consequences have been largely unexplored, particularly in a new context: the deep economic crisis in Spain. This study reviews and analyses the evolution of the research production and the changing contexts of policy trends affecting the ‘Roma education issue’ as they have developed in Spain during the past decade (2004-2014). The authors take as a starting point the groundbreaking study published in 2004 that focused on trajectories of educational achievement and continuity among Gitano youth, and go on to reconstruct the approaches undertaken by qualitative, quantitative and evaluation research since then, in relation to their contributions to improve policy recommendations. The role played by Spanish and European social and educational strategies addressed to the Gitano/Roma population is critically explored to challenge the controversial notion of a ‘Spanish model of Roma integration’. Finally, the authors argue that the deterioration of public education and the virtual disappearance of social benefits in recent years, in addition to the worrying actions taken against Roma citizens in the EU, are to account for the interrupted aspirations of a whole generation of Gitano/Roma youth.
The concepts of ‘lesson drawing’ and ‘policy transfer’ have become increasingly influential ways of understanding public policy, especially in the UK. However, the main proponents of the concepts, Rose for ‘lesson drawing’ and Dolowitz and Marsh for ‘policy transfer’, have difficulty in providing convincing answers to three questions that are important for them and those engaged in similar studies. First, can they be defined as distinctive forms of policy- making separate from other, more conventional, forms? ‘Lesson drawing’ is very similar to conventional accounts of ‘rational’ policy-making and ‘policy transfer’ is very difficult to define distinctly from many other forms of policy-making. Second, why does ‘lesson drawing’ and ‘policy transfer’ occur rather than some other form of policy-making? The proponents of ‘policy transfer’ put a set of diverse and conflicting theories under a common framework, obscuring differences between them. Third, what are the effects of ‘lesson drawing’ and ‘policy transfer’ on policy-making and how do they compare to other processes? Whilst the effect of more ‘lesson drawing’ seems to be more ‘rational’ policy-making, the effect of ‘policy transfer’ on policy ‘success’ and ‘failure’ is less clear. Dolowitz and Marsh redescribe aspects of ‘failure’ as different forms of ‘transfer’ rather than giving independent reasons for outcomes based on features of transfer processes. Overall, particularly in the case of ‘policy transfer’, researchers may be better off selecting from a range of alternative approaches than limiting themselves to these conceptual frameworks.
VIII Informe FOESSA 2019. Documento de trabajo 3.12
SUMARIO
Introducción
1. La población gitana en España: aspectos demográficos
2. Riesgo de exclusión social de la población gitana en España
3. Evolución de la situación social de la población gitana en España
4. Conclusiones: la recuperación económica apenas se refleja en la población gitana
"The idea of "the public sphere" in Habermas's sense designates a theater in modern societies in which political participation is enacted through the medium of talk. It is the space in which citizens deliberate about their common affairs." "Habermas stops short of developing a new, post-bourgeois model of the public sphere." "My argument enjoins four corresponding tasks on the critical theory of actually existing democracy. First, this theory should render visible the ways in which social inequality paints deliberation within publics in late-capitalist societies. Second, it shows how inequality affects relationships among publics in late-capitalist societies, how publics are differently empowered or segmented, and how some are involuntarily enclaved and subordinated to others. Next, a critical theory should expose ways in which the labeling of some issues and interests as " private" limits the range of problems, and of approaches to problems, that can be widely contested in contemporary societies. Finally, the theory should show how the overly weak character of some public spheres in late-capitalist societies denudes "public opinion" of practical force."
Yuval-Davis outlines an analytical framework for the study of belonging and the politics of belonging. Her article is divided into three interconnected parts. The first explores the notion of ‘belonging' and the different analytical levels on which it needs to be studied: social locations; identifications and emotional attachments; and ethical and political values. The second part focuses on the politics of belonging and how it relates to the participatory politics of citizenship as well as to that of entitlement and status. The third part illustrates, using British examples, some of the ways particular political projects of belonging select specific levels of belonging in order to construct their projects.