European Identity: Across Which Lines? Defining Europe Through Public Discourses on the Roma

This paper offers a careful look at the relationships between discursive constructions of minorities and discriminatory policy making in order to better account for the ways hegemonic cultural standards are prevalent in Europe, not only in prejudiced discourse, but also in apparently neutral practices such as institutional law making. By examining the different discourses surrounding a particular controversy—Italy's so-called “Maroni census”—I illustrate how public rhetoric and policies regarding contemporary Europe's different ethnic groups reduce racism and discrimination to the blatant deployment of essentializing categories. As a consequence, European institutions are fostering a European identity that, by refusing to acknowledge the existence of dividing, discriminatory lines, is reinscribing the inequalities that come with society's reliance on those same lines.