Conformism or inadequacy of Roma inclusion policies? : missed opportunities at the European and local levels

The Roma in Europe have been the object, over the past centuries, of a variety of (mostly discriminatory) policies, and more recently the target of integration strategies into mainstream (majority) societies. After experiencing a relative bettering of standards of living from the 1960s to the 1970s and 1980s, in the last two decades we have witnessed a general rise in the levels of both socio-economic exclusion as well as of anti-Roma sentiments on behalf of majority populations (Kovats 2001; Sigona and Treheran 2009). The Roma minority attracted significant European funds and attention over the past decade, the clearest expression of which has been the creation of policies that explicitly (even though not exclusively) target these groups. The policies that have been put into place so far, however, do not seem to have significantly bettered the situation, or at least not to the desired levels. To understand why it is so, this chapter offers a brief overview of the EU soft policies in the field of Roma integration, and a look at how these efforts have translated into actions and programmes