Real political will is needed for Roma
Why are the European Commission’s good intentions failing to bring significant change for Europe’s Roma?
It has been two years since the adoption of the EU ‘framework for national Roma integration strategies’. At the time, it was hailed as an important step forward in aiming to remove the obstacles the estimated 10 to 12 million Roma in Europe face in leading a decent life.
However, disappointment has since settled in among civil-society activists and there is increasing fear that these strategies will just remain on paper. The European Commission’s progress report on the National Roma Integration Strategies, issued today (26 June), confirms that the strategies remain largely ineffective and that the fight against discrimination – among others – has not been tackled convincingly.
One would have hoped that the lives of Roma in Europe would have improved since the framework’s adoption. The truth is that we are actually seeing an increase in racist incidents and hate speech targeting Roma. A recent EU survey shows that one in five Roma respondents were victims of racially motivated crime involving assault, threat or serious harassment at least once in the previous 12 months.
How can we explain the discrepancies between this unique EU policy approach aiming to foster Roma inclusion and the climate of impunity in Europe, between the EU’s good intentions and the reality on the ground? One key element of the answer is addressing anti-Gypsyism and its consequences for Roma communities.
Indeed, several consequences of anti-Gypsyism are not sufficiently reflected in the Commission’s progress report. First, pervasive structural and institutional racism prevents meaningful participation of Roma in designing and implementing effective policies and results in a paternalistic approach. Policies will not have the expected impact as long as Roma are not considered as essential stakeholders in the process that is intended to make a difference in their lives. Moreover, this situation creates a vicious circle, as the failure of policies gives arguments to populist discourses that Roma do not want to integrate, when it is actually non-Roma officials designing and implementing policies who are missing the point.
Commission recommendations encouraging member states to use positive-action measures and organise civil servants trainings are positive but still tend to consider Roma as service recipients and not real actors. The Commission could, for instance, do more to hire Roma in its own relevant departments.
In addition, implementation of social-inclusion strategies cannot succeed if politicians do not encourage the majority population to respect Roma and support equality. Instead, in some member states, public figures and politicians tend to give the opposite example by fuelling anti-Roma prejudice in their discourses and policies or by failing to publicly condemn rights abuses when Roma are physically or verbally attacked.
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One solution would be official recognition that Roma experience a specific form of racism and recognition of Europe’s past abuses, for instance by establishing Europe-wide ‘truth commissions’ to establish the truth about mass atrocities against Roma. This is an idea suggested by Thomas Hammarberg, a former human-rights commissioner with the Council of Europe.
Moreover, one of the most striking outcomes of European efforts in this area is that it is not about the lack of financial resources, but about the fact that European investments vanish into the sands of member states’ administrative processes long before they could reach the ground and make a difference in Roma people’s lives – where often a few thousand euros could bring tremendous improvement.
There is a clear danger that the framework’s aims will simply dissolve if there is no political leadership at the highest level in the EU member states to achieve real change for Roma. The European Commission must also continue to show its political will by being proactive in ensuring real participation of Roma communities in shaping policies and putting pressure on member states that misuse EU funds or fail to implement the strategies (or both).
Michael Privot is the director of the European Network Against Racism (ENAR).