Evicting Rome’s Undesirables - Global Rome: Changing Faces of the Eternal City - page 97

tended to be the explicit targets of local government intervention and policies,2
Roma groups have, since the 1980s, been the objects of a clear strategy of manage-
ment of urban spaces which has selectively dictated which parts of the city are
accessible to them and which are off-limits. This exclusive attention to Roma has
been motivated by notions of “otherness” and danger—their alleged propensity
to bring crime and urban degradation—that have been historically associated
with those labeled zingari and nomadi (gypsies and nomads). of all the capital's
communities, the Roma are the group most frequently “evicted from eternity”
(herzfeld 2009) or, more precisely, they are those most commonly subjected to
policies of displacement (see also Cervelli, chapter 3).3 The last decade has seen
a dramatic intensification in the municipal authorities' rhetoric concerning a
perceived need to achieve order and security in the city. much of this securitiz-
ing discourse, and the practices it has spawned, have focused on managing the
Roma population.4 The Roma have long been targeted by drives to distance them
from Rome and other italian cities; however, we argue that today's exclusionary
practices are occurring within a new urban order which is redesigning the city's
spatial and social geographies. The many recent projects to transform and reha-
bilitate parts of the city have often had as their corollary the removal of Roma
from residence and commercial activity in its neighborhoods and public spaces.
This is effecting a clear erosion in their right to the city; a right which not only
concerns the possibility of living within its boundaries but also the right to stable
social relations, to visibility, and to a recognition of their needs and expectations.
most scholarship on Roma in italy's cities takes a top-down approach, ana-
lyzing laws, institutional policies and practices, and the effects that these have
on Roma communities. in this chapter, we instead focus on the microlevel, tak-
ing two small episodes which have involved the city's Roma and which concern
their living spaces, possibilities of income generation, and political participation.
Rather than viewing Roma as passive victims of state power, we aim to highlight
some of the dynamics of interaction between local authorities and Roma's strate-
gies for reentry and reappropriation of parts of the city, stressing, though, that the
relationship is a highly asymmetrical one which produces a cycle of expulsion, re-
entry and, ultimately, further expulsion. This microapproach enables us to grasp
some of the very human consequences of much larger processes of globalization,
gentrification, and the regimentation of urban space, underlining how the mo-
dernity that seeks to monitor and manage its subjects and spaces intersects with
individuals' informal strategies of presence, creation, and reappropriation.
from Center to periphery and back again
until 2005, one of the largest Roma settlements in the city was located on vicolo
savini, a narrow street in the ostiense neighborhood, just a few minutes' walk
from the tourist hubs of trastevere, the basilica of saint paul outside the walls,