What's in a name? : causes and consequences of labelling minorities as "national" or "migrant" : Roma in Italy and Spain

Abstract

This article analyses how Roma are represented in official policy narratives in Italy and Spain by comparing the four cycles of the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities in the two countries. By tracing the representations that the Italian and Spanish governments hold (and make) about the Roma, I sketch out the different categories that EUropean countries recur to as organizing principles to “other” underprivileged minorities. Based on the tailored-approaches in which both Italy and Spain engage in framing Roma as either a “national” minority or not, I suggest that constructing or “producing” a minority in our imagined communities as characterized by national, cultural, social or migrant characteristics relies more on political expediency than on objective analytical categories.