Roma discrimination and stigmatization in Europe are well-documented, with urban scholars emphasizing pervasive prejudices and stereotypes alongside negative policy outcomes. However, the focus on Roma marginality has tended to centre on punitive state and urban governance to the neglect of everyday urban relations. In this article we focus on the micro manifestations of stigmatization--racialized urban encounters--and their neglected longer-term affects for Roma in Czechia and Romania. Ethnographic research and in-depth qualitative interviews with Roma respondents expose a complex, dynamic and multi-layered response to stigmatization that challenges the simplistic binary of resistance versus the internalization of stigma. The concept of fragmented habitus is deployed in capturing this dynamic process and providing a nuanced representation of the urban inhabitation of a long-term stigmatized and racialized position, beyond generic 'Otherness'. We argue for more attention to the specificities and complexities of everyday relations and their affects in capturing the interdependence between urban encounters, the longer-term construction of Roma inferiority, and the heterogeneous, dynamic and ambivalent ways in which Roma inhabit their racialized urban position.
This paper addresses the influence of organized crime on the performance of democracy in the Czech Republic and seeks to determine which dimensions of its political system (if any) are most endangered. We construe organized crime in terms of corruption networks, questioning in effect the predominant understanding of these two concepts as distinct or even exclusive phenomena. The paper thus construes corruption and organized crime as concepts referring to transgressive acts (i.e., behavior that involves a violation of moral or social boundaries that need not be legally codified), rather than in terms of legal norms. The influence of corruption networks is demonstrated using the “Nagygate” affair, which is analyzed using Maltz’s framework of potential harm. We argue that the debate on organized crime in the Czech Republic is, in fact, inherently tied to the study of corruption, since corruption constitutes an integral part of organized crime activity. Our findings are that transgressive behavior has a mostly negative impact, including loss of trust, the widespread belief that injustice goes unpunished, a weakening of the political system, and degeneration of the democratic regime. Moreover, the Nagygate scandal provides evidence that democratic institutions are not solely victims of organized crime but also a potential source of transgressive acts.
Bouncers have recently attracted the interest of criminologists, some of whom have utilized Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts to grasp the sociocultural realities of bouncing. The present study continues this line of enquiry, aiming to demonstrate that bouncer ethnography will benefit from yet another of Bourdieu’s concepts, that of the field. A study of bouncers in a Czech city is utilized to argue that (1) field analysis is a valuable analytical framework for ethnographic research in this context, (2) it allows relationships both among bouncers and between them and other relevant agents to be explored, (3) it has the potential to investigate these relationships without criminalizing them, and (4) it provides a framework for comparative studies of bouncing in different contexts.
One of the countries impacted to a lesser degree by the illegal trade in tobacco products is the Czech Republic. Recently the proportion of counterfeit or smuggled cigarettes declined by approximately 3 % of the market while decentralisation and fragmentation are the main processes underlining the black trade in tobacco products. In spite of this, the illegal sector in the CR has taken on country-specific characteristics attributable to geographic location, and these have also significantly impacted domestic distribution. Until 2014 there was no existing official, expert, or scientific dataset focused on the black market in tobacco and on its actors and their relationships. This study is the first to report comprehensively on the form taken by black-market trade in tobacco products in the Czech Republic. The main objective of the study is to uncover the dominant patterns of the illegal tobacco market structure, the modus operandi of the distribution chain and financial management of the trade. The paper is based on the analysis of official documents, interviews with security experts, and interviews with those involved in criminal activity centred on tobacco products.
Poverty business has become an important metaphor in the current debate regarding security in socially excluded localities. The term poverty business covers a range of business practices aimed at the poorest and most vulnerable populations. The goal of this study is to examine media representations of the phenomenon using content analysis of quantitative and qualitative data. First, characteristics of Czech media messages including the term “poverty business” are analysed. Next, key events are identified which have shaped the way poverty business is reported on in the analysed corpus. Finally, topics, groups and key actors are analysed based on the development of their quantitative representation in the corpus over time.
The poverty business has recently become a frequent issue in public discourse. The Program Declaration of the Government of the Czech Republic also reflects this, as the poverty business is mentioned here in relation to the abuse of the welfare system through overpriced lodging houses. In spite of the political significance of the poverty business, the research on this issue has been scant. No attempt has even been made to clarify the meaning of this concept. This study is meant to be a first step in understanding the poverty business in the Czech context; it aims to explore how this phenomenon was represented in the Czech news media. The research was based on the theory of representation and qualitative content analysis, a method that was devised for thematic analysis of media content. The data were drawn from the Anopress IT database. Out of 1,277 texts containing the term "poverty business" and similar relevant terms, 66 texts were selected for the analysis. The analysis found that the poverty business is mainly presented as a matter of housing; however, other meanings were also identified, all of which were connected to the idea of exploitation of the poor and vulnerable segments of society. The victims of the poverty business include not only the clients of poverty entrepreneurs but also other people who were categorized according to their alleged decency or indecency. The consequences of the poverty business were seen as relating to clients, interethnic coexistence and the public administration. The main subjects identified in media communications were the state, municipality, and poverty entrepreneurs, who played the role of culprits, profiting subjects, and rectifiers. To conclude, the poverty business was represented as a highly politicized issue that concerns the misuse of housing benefits and is seen both as a socioeconomic and ethno-cultural problem. The solution to the poverty business was mostly conceived as a technical intervention into the welfare system, ignoring the agency of the victims of the poverty business.
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