The Roma: A Largely Segregated Community in Central and Eastern Europe by Burkhard Paetzold

Jolan Lakatos, a Roma teacher in a tiny preschool for Roma children in Gat, a village in Carpath-Ukraine, runs to prepare tea for us, visitors from the 2008 Global Exchange of Presbyterian Women. Meanwhile, she talks to us about the situation in the so-called “Roma camp,” which is more of a ghetto. It’s not easy to prepare tea—running water and electricity are not readily available here. Likewise, it’s not easy to convince parents to send their kids to preschool. Few of the parents expect their children’s lives will change after attending school. Too many generations have lived in unhealthy conditions and poorly insulated houses in too many Roma camps, unemployed, poor, segregated and often harassed by the police.

In the central and eastern European countries visited by the Global Exchange, Roma have endured extremely difficult times, particularly in the twentieth century. Germany’s Nazi rulers, with delusions of racial purity, killed half a million Roma in concentration camps. The communist regimes, with their illusion of equal treatment for everyone, tried to assimilate the Roma, forcing them to give up their culture. The new regimes, in their hasty run toward market economies and individual freedom, forgot about the socially deprived, less-educated, and people of different values.

The Roma are the largest minority in Europe—without a specific country of their own—though their number is growing rapidly and exceeds the population of many European nations. Many Roma communities are segregated, and tens of thousands live in generational poverty.

What can you do to partner with the Roma and those working with Roma Communities? Find out by reading the full text of this article in the March/April 2009 issue of Horizons.

Call (866) 802-3635 or subscribe to Horizons or order the March/April 2009 issue (HZN-09-210; $4 plus shipping).

Burkhard Paetzold is the PC(USA)'s regional liaison for Central and Eastern Europe.

Photo by Laura Lee, PW Art Director
(A family in the Roma village of Nagydobrony, Ukraine)

Other Articles Online This Issue


What can you do to partner with the Roma and those working with Roma Communities? Find out by reading the full text of this article in the March/April 2009 issue of Horizons. Call (866) 802-3635 or subscribe to Horizons or order the March/April 2009 issue (HZN-09-210; $4 plus shipping).	The Roma: A Largely Segregated Community in Central and Eastern Europe by Burkhard Paetzold Jolan Lakatos, a Roma teacher in a tiny preschool for Roma children in Gat, a village in Carpath-Ukraine, runs to prepare tea for us, visitors from the 2008 Global Exchange of Presbyterian Women. Meanwhile, she talks to us about the situation in the so-called “Roma camp,” which is more of a ghetto. It’s not easy to prepare tea—running water and electricity are not readily available here. Likewise, it’s not easy to convince parents to send their kids to preschool. Few of the parents expect their children’s lives will change after attending school. Too many generations have lived in unhealthy conditions and poorly insulated houses in too many Roma camps, unemployed, poor, segregated and often harassed by the police. In the central and eastern European countries visited by the Global Exchange, Roma have endured extremely difficult times, particularly in the twentieth century. Germany’s Nazi rulers, with delusions of racial purity, killed half a million Roma in concentration camps. The communist regimes, with their illusion of equal treatment for everyone, tried to assimilate the Roma, forcing them to give up their culture. The new regimes, in their hasty run toward market economies and individual freedom, forgot about the socially deprived, less-educated, and people of different values. The Roma are the largest minority in Europe—without a specific country of their own—though their number is growing rapidly and exceeds the population of many European nations. Many Roma communities are segregated, and tens of thousands live in generational poverty. What can you do to partner with the Roma and those working with Roma Communities? Find out by reading the full text of this article in the March/April 2009 issue of Horizons. Call (866) 802-3635 or subscribe to Horizons or order the March/April 2009 issue (HZN-09-210; $4 plus shipping). Burkhard Paetzold is the PC(USA)'s regional liaison for Central and Eastern Europe. Photo by Laura Lee, PW Art Director (A family in the Roma village of Nagydobrony, Ukraine) Other Articles Online This Issue Presbyterian Mission in Europe The Roma That All May be One Moscow Protestant Chaplaincy List of 2008 Global Exchange Participants Installation Service for Presbyterian Women Joined and Knitted Together in Love Strengthening the PC(USA)	Current Issue MAR/APR 2009 About This Issue Contents FREE Resource How to Use In Our Next Issue to Horizons or call (866) 802-3635 the March/April 2009 issue, HZN-09-210 ($4 plus shipping/handling)

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