Social Mobilities in the Transnational Migration of Romanian Roma to Italy

Abstract

The article can be included in the contemporary debate about the role that transnational migrations play in modifying the European social order. There is general agreement about the fact that, in the modern-day global framework, while transnational migration can improve the living conditions of some, they can also make things worse for others and can contribute to creating new forms of inequality rather than curtailing old ones. Scholars agree that international migration can lead to profound social changes through social remittances or cultural mobilities, but they are skeptical about the possibility of considerable re-stratification both in receiving and origin countries.

The article therefore investigates changes in status within some Romanian Roma migrant networks in Italy based on a set of qualitative and ethnographic data compiled during the European project The Immigration of Romanian Roma to Western Europe: Causes, Effects and Future Engagement Strategies – MigRom.

This article demonstrates how Romanian Roma migration is only able to produce status changes in migration partially, and highlights how these changes are the result of a diverse combination of factors, such as Roma migrants' motivation, ambition, and opportunities, but above all migration policies and anti-Gypsyism in the origin and receiving countries.