The Roma’s right to housing in Romania: the efficiency of legal versus policy interventions

This paper explores the Roma’s housing rights in Romania by revisiting a classic debate in socio-legal literature on the efficiency of tools of social change in improving the fate of marginalized minorities. We situate contemporary housing struggles within a broader historical and structural context marked by exclusionary state practices, forced sedentarization under socialism, and post-socialist transformations – such as privatization, shrinking public housing, and neoliberal reforms – that deepened segregation and inequalities. The first case study assesses litigation by “repeat players” in domestic and international courts, interrogating the utility of diverse legal frames and strategies, their impacts, and their ability to provide remedies against pogroms, evictions, and denials of social housing. The paper argues that EU accession and donor influence entrenched the racial/ethnic discrimination legal frame, generating only symbolic legal victories for Roma clients, which, however, increased pressure on local governments, indirectly leading to Roma housing programmes. The second case study compares these projects in two localities, highlighting tensions between policy ideals and community needs. We argue that the paradox of desegregation – where rigid enforcement can undermine access to housing – reveals the fragile legitimacy of local authorities, whose willingness to provide housing depends on maintaining legitimacy in the eyes of anti-Roma constituencies.