When Patchworks Dissolve

Postdoc Camilla Ida Ravnbøl has contributed to the new issue of FEANTSA - European Federation of National Organisations Working with the Homeless. FEANTSA dedicates their winter 2020 edition of the Homeless in Europe magazine to the Roma individuals and families who experience homelessness or are at risk of homelessness across the EU.

Camilla Ida Ravnbøl's article, When Patchworks Dissolve: Perspectives on Destitute Roma Families' Economic Livelihoods, builds on ongoing ethnographic fieldwork, initiated in 2014 among a group of 40 Roma from Romania experiencing homelessness in Copenhagen, Denmark. 

In Denmark, as in many other European cities, Roma people are often seen engaging in forms of informal and low-income labour in order to make a livelihood. Camilla Ida Ravnbøl scratches beneath the surface to uncover just how precarious reliance on this type of income really is for Roma families, showing how the economic situation of Roma people can be viewed as a patchwork pattern about to fall apart at the seams. 

The article explores the contexts of the poverty facing these Roma families and their trajectories to Denmark. It relates these findings to an analysis of the families’ household finances. Finally, it discusses the impact of the ongoing covid-19 pandemic on their livelihood.

Get access to the article: When Patchworks Dissolve: Perspectives on Destitute Roma Families' Economic Livelihoods.