The informal faces of the (neo-)ghetto: State confinement, formalization and multidimensional informalities in Italy’s Roma camps

Abstract

This article extends Wacquant’s theorization of how state institutions confine, control and punish racialized poor groups, arguing that a central modality for managing urban marginality occurs through institutional generation of and participation in spheres of informality. Focusing on Italy’s segregation of Roma in ‘neo-ghettos’, this study explores how Roma’s confinement has been produced and modulated through contradictory policies, their ambiguous implementation by meso-level actors, and Roma’s micro-level navigation of ensuing arrangements. Drawing on extensive ethnographic fieldwork in Rome, it traces how ambivalent formalization drives have bifurcated the city’s very diverse Roma populations into two main sociospatial configurations, surveillance-intensive ‘villages’ and unauthorized micro-encampments, producing intertwined informalities in housing and employment that reinforce power inequalities despite Roma’s attempts to exert some agency and autonomy through building social capital within and beyond their communities. Variable informalities thus emerge as a core dimension through which resources and constraints are selectively apportioned as techniques of governmentality implemented by different institutions and actors.

‘Get out of Traian Square!’: Roma Stigmatization as a Mobilizing Tool for the Far Right in Timişoara, Romania

“…The current trend of emphasizing segregation through the creation of neo‐ghettos has been linked to economic and political interests (Clough Marinaro, ; ) and to attempts to avoid harassment (Filčák and Steger, ; Powell and Lever, ). The pressures on Roma housing in Romanian urban areas has been considered in Lancione's (; ) and Chelcea's (; ) ethnographic works.…”

The Power of Group Stigmatization: Wealthy Roma, Urban Space and Strategies of Defence in Post‐socialist Romania

“…Urban scholars have utilized this thesis to good effect in their attempt to understand the complexities of the marginalized Roma ghetto, by highlighting the trend towards Roma segregation; environmental exclusion; the potential positives of the ghetto in terms of internal solidarity; and the avoidance of hostility and harassment (Filčák and Steger, ; Clough Marinaro, ; Walach, ; Powell and Lever, ). However, it is important to note that while Clough Marinaro's recent work (2015; ) on Roma camps in Rome points to the unravelling of internal solidarity within what she terms the Roma ‘neo‐ghetto’, which is strategically undermined by external economic and political interests, Maestri's rich ethnography (; ) of the same city informs us of new squatter solidarities for Roma and challenges the essentialization and exceptionalism of the Roma category. These empirical accounts underscore the specificity of national context and the dynamic relations of the ghetto.…”

Grassroots Roma Women Organizing for Social Change: A Study of the Impact of ‘Roma Women Student Gatherings’

“…Many Roma women deserve to participate in spaces of decision-making. However, many times, asymmetric power relations between Roma and non-Roma people and the fact that public institutions are often constructed as ethnicity-blind spaces become a barrier for Roma women to engage [50,51]. The gatherings become a space tailored to women and in which non-academic women are the protagonists.…”