Displacement and Discrimination
‘Evictability' of Refugees in Revanchist Rome
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.14288/acme.v19i1.1965Keywords:
Displacement, refugees, squatting, RomeAbstract
In this paper, displacements in the form of fast evictions of ‘refugees-squatters’ in Rome are analysed as intersecting with increased racial discrimination and the marginalization of refugees in Italy. Drawing on in-depth ethnographic research before, during and after the involuntary removal of refugees from the occupied building of Via Curtatone in 2017, the paper suggests that fast evictions of ‘refugees’ and/or ‘transit migrants’ in Italy is employed as an anti-migrant device. For precarious migrants in Italy, the housing question is of uttermost importance as it is connected to their access to welfare services. Fast evictions disrupt migrants’ ability to relocate and rearrange their lives in ways that such access could be sustained. Thus, the evictability of migrants in Italy has become a political tool to suppress solidarity practices among and for unwanted populations.
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