Our approach

Initial situation

Antiziganism, i.e. specific racism against Sinti* and Roma* or people considered to be Sinti* and Roma*, has been widespread in Europe for centuries and is deeply rooted in the collective consciousness. Sinti* and Roma* arrived in Western Europe around 600 years ago and the first persecutions and marginalisations are already documented from this time. The antigypsyist stereotypes have remained astonishingly stable over the centuries - this also shows that they are a projection, an enemy image of the dominant society, not the characteristics of real people. As early as the late Middle Ages, for example, Sinti* and Roma* were banned from settling down. Their exclusion, defamation and persecution culminated in the racist genocide by the National Socialists: around half a million Sinti* and Roma* were murdered, 90 per cent of the community. This genocide was only recognised as such a few decades ago.

Today, Sinti* and Roma* are the largest European minority with 10 to 12 million people. In Germany, antiziganistic marginalisation is often seen as an Eastern European issue. In reality, however, German Sinti* or French Manouche can report the same. The level of awareness in European dominant societies is so low that stereotypes are sometimes not even recognised as such. The Leipzig Authoritarianism Study and other surveys regularly show enormous approval rates for antiziganistic statements.

There are now numerous self-organisations of Sinti* and Roma*, some of which can already look back on several decades of successful civil rights work. There are efforts at European level and there are young Sinti* and Roma* who are networking internationally, empowering themselves and campaigning against antiziganism. The Competence center against antiziganism sees itself as an ally and bridge builder in the memorial landscape and the dominant society.

How do we want to change things?

KogA combines historical-political education in the context of NS-memorials with human rights and democracy education as well as practice and organisational development that is critical of racism. In order to stimulate sustainable change, we are not only concerned with individual rethinking, but also with analysing institutional structures, cultures and practices, for example in public authorities or schools. In our Education work, we address the social structures that create discrimination against Sinti* and Roma*. In doing so, we attach great importance to cooperation with Roma* and Sinti* activists and self-organisations.

In our training and counselling services, we place a strong focus on practical skills and combine historical-political education work in the context of memorial sites with methods of democracy and human rights education. This is complemented by approaches, concepts and methods for the inclusive development of schools, municipalities and organisations as well as diversity and human rights-oriented personnel and organisational development.

With our counselling and educational services, we promote both critical reflection on our own attitudes and sensitisation to the mechanisms and effects of institutional discrimination. The removal of structural barriers in particular can make a significant contribution to the equal participation of Sinti* and Roma* in our society.

In addition to our traditional seminar programme and our work in the cooperation network, we are also working on anchoring the topic of antiziganism more firmly in the memorial site context. We are in the process of establishing further event formats, as well as digital education work in social media. We are focussing on historical and political education via Instagram, including posts on current political debates and media monitoring on the topic.

Objectives

• Expand press and public relations work to make antiziganism more visible and raise awareness of it
• Organising low-threshold public events (e.g. cultural events) to reach new target groups, support the communities and make their diversity visible
• Planning, designing and implementing qualification measures for professional actors from various institutions (in-house, one-day seminars, modular programmes)
• Working with institutions and organisations as part of the "Qualify - Advise - Support" approach
• Development of a nationwide infrastructure in the cooperation network
• Expansion of the "Network for historical-political education work on the history of persecution of Sinti and Roma under National Socialism"
• Qualifying - advising - accompanying multiplicators in memorial sites on intersectional, antiziganism-critical and cross-phenomenal approaches.

We, as a team of people not affected by antiziganism, do not claim or intend to produce our own definition of antiziganism, but work with definitions that people from the Sinti* and Roma* communities have contributed to or published.

There are a variety of definitions, all of which emphasise different aspects of antiziganism. We work with a definition that takes into account the historical roots, the systematic marginalisation and the construction of those affected as "the others". A central point here is the systematic persecution and extermination of Sinti* and Roma* in the Nazi era (and other people persecuted under the racist label) and the significance of the genocide and persecution for antiziganism today. It is also important in the definition we work with that antiziganism restricts, marginalises, discriminates against, physically injures or even kills those affected at all levels of everyday life.