Methodological approach to the roma and other ethnic groups: ‘ethnic’ policy or a policy for emancipation of the individual Cover Image
  • Price 4.90 €

Методологическият подход към ромите и другите етноси: политика за етноса или политика за еманципация на индивида?
Methodological approach to the roma and other ethnic groups: ‘ethnic’ policy or a policy for emancipation of the individual

Author(s): Nikolai Tilkidjiev
Subject(s): Social Sciences
Published by: Институт по философия и социология при БАН

Summary/Abstract: The discussion is based on the experience from a concrete project on Roma dropouts from school and on the results of numerous studies on Bulgarian Roma problems; the author infers some basic shortcomings of what has been done so far in this field, and stresses the dissatisfaction with the lack of a serious system, rationality, continuity in project activity, the closure and unnecessary secrecy about much of the data, analyses and conclusions (as if they were „classified“), the need for rethinking and systematizing the overall available documentation and information. Another important obstacle to the success of „Roma projects“ is the lack of a clear and consistently conducted political will, of an integral national strategy, of a unifying general national and state framework for solving the problems of the Roma regardless of the concrete political circumstances. The author indicates a precondition for success: the creation and operation of an integral national information system with a complete and accessible archive, which will bring order, efficiency, respect for authors rights, selection for all projects, policies and practices in the field. The system must be created and maintained in partnership between three sides: the state (central and local government), experts (scholars and researchers), and the civic sector (NGOs). An important conclusion drawn from some of the projects is that the Roma must no longer be perceived only or mainly as an object on which to exert influence but also as an active subject and actual participant in the resolving of their own problems, as a stakeholder. A precondition of success is that Roma topics be discussed with complete openness, be made the object of frank public debate. The main methodological issue is the substitution of social-differentiating criteria with ethnic ones, the „ethnicizing of the social“, the insertion of the ethnic community as a mediator in the solution of purely social problems. This imposes on the Roma the status of a „privileged minority“, which in turn provokes nationalistic anti-Roma feelings. This „mediation“ postpones the solution of a large part of the problems of the Roma population, for it does not take into account the specifics of modern and post-modern society, the fact that the rise in social status does not come about through the community, including the ethnic community, but through the individual, through individual efforts and achievements (in education, work, etc.). The success of the Roma can be a result not of the success of the ethnic group as a whole but of separate individuals, representatives of this community: the individual needs to be emancipated from the community of kin and ethnos; this is an epoch-making transition that has not been completed among the Roma. This is even more relevant in view of the fact that, from a European perspective, rights and obligations are individual, not collective.

  • Issue Year: 40/2008
  • Issue No: Spec. 1
  • Page Range: 7-23
  • Page Count: 17
  • Language: Bulgarian