THE AMBIVALENT AUTONOMY OF MOBILE “POCĂIȚI” BE-TWEEN VICOVU DE SUS, ROMANIA AND TURIN, ITALY AFTER 1989
Keywords:
intra-EU labour migration, post-communism, subjectivation, pentecostalism, ne-oliberalism from belowAbstract
Intra-EU labour migration literature is fairly limited within migration studies and it has seldom considered migrants' embodied experiences and processes of subjectivation as a constitutive element of translocal economic transformations. The present paper focuses on the popular economies enacted by a segment of the migrant working class moving from Vicovu de Sus in Suceava district, Romania to Turin, Italy, after 1989 as entangled in the production of “neoliberalism from below” (Gago, 2015). Mobilizing oral histories collected during an ethnographic fieldwork undertaken between 2012 and 2013, I will present some aspects related to the fields of production and reproduction within the movements of migrants belonging to a pentecostal community affiliated to the Cultul Penticostal – Biserica lui Dumnezeu Apostolică. Pentecostalism is here understood as a performative regime of truth and practices (Foucault, 1987; Marshall, 2009), through which migrant bodies perform processes of subjectivation to actively inhabit the borders of the State and Capital. Bukovinean pentecostal discourse, through an entrepreneurial drive, a cultural shift towards material prosperity and a strict gendered division of labour, seems to have fostered the creation of a self-organized translocal community whose economic practices obey/re-enact rather than escape/re-signify the dynamics of exploitation and dispossession proper of Romania's peripheral incorporation into contemporary global regimes of production, accumulation and division of labour.
References
Allasino, E. (2000). Immigrati in Piemonte. Una panoramica sulla presenza degli stranieri nel territorio regionale. IRES, WP 143/2000.
Andreiescu, V. (2012). Istoria penticostalismului românesc. Oradea: Casa Cărții.
Andrijasevic, R., Sacchetto, D. (2016). From labour migration to labour mobility? The re-turn of the multinational worker in Europe. Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research, 22(2): 219-231.
Anghel, R. (2013). Romanians in Western Europe. Lanham: Lexington Books.
Aubrée, M. (2003). Un néo-pentecôtisme Brésilien parmi les populations immigrées en Europe de l’Ouest. Anthropologie et Sociétés, 27(1):65-84.
Balcanu, A. (2009). Italian images of Romanian female immigrants : From sex-slaves to successful managers. Cultures in Transit 2, Jun 2009, Lyon, France.
Ban, C. (2009). Economic Transnationalism and its Ambiguities: The Case of Romanian Migration to Italy. International Migration, 50(6): 129–149.
Ban, C. (2011). Neoliberalism in Translation. Economic Ideas and Reforms in Spain and Romania. Ph.D. Thesis. University of Maryland.
Bayart, J.-F. (2008). Comparing from below. Sociétés politiques comparées, 1:1-25.
Bazzicalupo, L. (2008). Dimensioni Politiche dell'impresa sociale. Impresa Sociale, 2 :63-81.
Beaumont, F. (2005). La frontière roumano-ukrainienne et le poids réel de la question des Minorités. Cybergeo, 303.
Berta, G. (2007). La questione settentrionale: economia e società in trasformazione. Mi-lano: Feltrinelli.
Bleahu, A. (2004). Romanian migration to Spain: Motivations, networks and strategies. In D. Pop (ed.) New Patterns of Labour Migration in Central and Eastern Europe. Cluj Napoca: AMM.
Boris, E., Parrenas, R. S. (2010). Intimate Labors : Culture, Technologies, and the Politics of Care. Standford : Standford University Press.
Butler, J. (1990). Gender trouble. Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge.
Carfagna, M., Pittau, F. (2003). Italia: 20 anni di regolarizzazioni. In Caritas (ed.). Dossier Statistico Immigrazione 2003. Roma: Anterem.
Castagnoli, A. (1998). Da Detroit a Lione. Trasformazione economica e governo locale a Turin (1970-1990). Milano: Franco Angeli.
Chelcea, L. (2002). Informal Credit, Money and Time in the Romanian Countryside. Paper presented at the Fourth Nordic Conference on the Anthropology of Post-Socialism, Copenhagen. http://www.anthrobase.com/Txt/C/Chelcea_L_01.htm (Accessed 07/10/2016).
Colombo, A., Sciortino, G. (2004). Gli immigrati in Italia. Bologna: Il Mulino.
Cominu, S., Musso, S. (2009). Società e lavoratori della conoscenza a Turin. In G. Berta (ed.) Società e lavoratori della conoscenza a Turin. Turin: Associazione Turin In-ternazionale.
De Genova, N. (2016). The “crisis” of the European border regime: Towards a Marxist theory of borders. International Socialism, 150: 31-54.
De Lauretis, T. (1987). Technologies of Gender : Essays on Theory, Film and Fiction. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Degiuli, F. (2007). A job with no boundaries: home eldercare work in Italy. European Journal of Women's Studies, 14(3): 193-207.
Degiuli, F. (2016). Caring for a living : migrant women, aging citizens and italian fami-lies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ehrenreich, B., Hochschild, A. R. (2003). Global woman: Nannies, maids, and sex workers in the new economy. New York: Metropolitan Books.
Elrick, T., Ciobanu, O. (2009). Migration networks and policy impacts:. Insights from Romanian-Spanish migrations. Global Networks, 9(1): 100-116.
Eriksen, A. (2016). The virtuous woman and the holy nation : Femininity in the context of Pentecostal Christianity in Vanuatu. The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 27(2) :260-275.
Favell, A. and Nebe, T. (2009). East-West migration and the impact of EU enlargement. In A. Favell, E. Recchi (ed.) Pioneers of European Identity: Citizenship and Mobility in the EU. Cheltenham and Northampton: Edward Elgar Publishing.
Federici, S. (2012). The Unifinished Feminist Revolution. The Commoner, 15 : 185-197.
Ferrero, M., Perocco, F. (2011). Razzismo al lavoro. Il sistema della discriminazione sul lavoro, la cornice giudirica, gli strumenti di tutela. Milano: Franco Angeli.
Foucault, M. (1976). Histoire de la Sexualité Vol 1: la volonté de savoir. Paris: Gallimard.
Foszto, L. (2009). Ritual revitalisation after socialism. Community, personhood, and conversion among Roma in a Transylvanian village. Berlin: LIT-Verlag.
Foszto, L., Kiss, D. (2013). Pentecostalism in Romania. La ricerca folklorica, 65: 51-64
Foucault, M. (1987). The ethic of care for the self as a practice of freedom: an interview with Michel Foucault on January 20, 1984. In R. Fornet-Batancourt, H. Becker, A. Gomez- Müller and J.D. Gauthier. Philosophy & Social Criticism, 12(2-3): 112-131.
Gago, V. (2015). Financialization of Popular Life and the Extractive Operations of Capital: A Perspective from Argentina. South-Atlantic Quarterly, 114(1): 11-28.
Gog, S. and Roth, M. (2012). The Roma People of Romania. In M. Palmer and S. Burgess (eds.) The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Religion and Social Justice. Malden: Blackwell.
Grappi, G. and Sacchetto, D. (2013). La gestione e la produzione delle differenze: razza e razzismo nei processi lavorativi italiani. Studi culturali, 2: 315-322.
Gunder Frank, A. (1991). Transitional Ideological Modes: Feudalism, Capitalism, Social-ism. Critique of Anthropology, 11(2): 171-188.
Horvath, I. (2008). The Culture of Migration of Rural Romanian Youth. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 34(5): 771-786.
Hüwelmeier, G. and Krause, K. (eds.). Traveling Spirits. Migrants, Markets, and Mobili-ties. Oxford, New York: Routledge.
Iordachi, C., Dobrincu, D. (2009). Transforming peasants, property and power : the col-lectivization of agriculture in Romania, 1949-1962. Budapest: CEU Press.
IRES Piemonte and FIERI (2011). Progetto D.I. Ter – Osservatorio sull'immigrazione in Piemonte. http://www.piemonteimmigrazione.it/site/components/com_mtree/ attachment.php?link_id=447&cf_id=60 (Accessed 20/10/2016)
Kalb, D. and Halmai, G. (2011). Headlines of Nation, Subtext of Class. Working Class Populism and the Return of the Repressed in Neoliberal Europe. New York: Berghahn Books.
Kaneff, D., Pine, F. (2011). Global Connections and Emerging Inequalities in Europe. London: Anthem Press.
Kideckel, D. (2008). Getting by in Postsocialist Romania. Bloomington and Indianopolis: Indiana University Press.
Ludtke, A. (1995). The History of Everyday Life: Reconstructing Historical Experiences and Ways of Life. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Marshall, R. (1991). Power in the Name of Jesus. Review of African Political Economy, 52 : 21-38.
Marshall, R. (2009). Political spiritualities: The pentecostal revolution in Nigeria. Chi-gaco: University of Chicago Press.
Meardi, G. (2012). Social Failures of EU Enlargement. A Case of Workers Voting with Their Feet. London: Routledge.
Meeus, B. (2013). Welfare through migrant work : What if the Romanian 'safety valve' closes?. Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 13(2): 175-194.
Mezzadra, S., Neilson, B. (2013). Border as Method, or, the Multiplication of Labour. Durham: Duke University Press.
Mitropoulos, A. (2007). Autonomy, Recognition, Movement. In S. Shukaitis, D. Graeber, and E. Biddle (eds) Constituent Imagination. Militant Investigations, Collective Theorization. Oakland: AK Press.
Mollona, M. (2005). Made in Sheffield. An Ethnography of Industrial Work and Politics. New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books.
Moulier-Boutang, Y. (1998). De l'esclavage au salariat. Economie historique du salariat bridé. Paris: PUF.
Neagoe-Pleşa, E., Pleşa, L. (2005). Cultele neoprotestante din România în perioada 1975-1989. In A. Petcu (ed.) Partidul, Securitatea şi Cultele, 1945-1989. Bucharest: Edi-tura Nemira.
Papadopoulos, D., Stephenson, N., Tsianos, V. (2008). Escape Routes: Control and Sub-version in the 21st Century. London: Pluto.
Piperno, F. (2007). From Care Drain to Care Gain : Migration in Romania and Ukraine and the rise of transnational welfare. Development, 50: 63-68.
Poenaru, F. (2008). On the Socialist Balcony: State, Citizens and Ideology in a Romanian Neighborhood. Saarbrücken: VDM Verlag.
Poenaru, F. (2013). Contesting Illusion. History and Intellectual Class Struggle in Post-Communist Romania. Ph.D. Thesis. Central European University.
Polgár, A. (2012). '1989'. IDEA artă + societate / arts + society, 42: 141.
Potot, S. (2000). Mobilité en Europe. Etude de deux réseaux migratoires roumains. Soci-ologie Românească, 2: 101-119.
Radu, C. (2001). De la Crângeni-Teleorman spre Spania: antreprenoriat, adventism şi mi-graţie circulatorie. Sociologie Românească, 1-4: 215-231.
Razvan, S. (2005). Patterns and Socio-economic Consequences of International Labour Migration on Catholic and Orthodox Villages from Eastern Romania (Neamt Coun-try). In T. Bárány, G. Pulay and I. Zakariás (eds.) A Tarkaság Dicsérete. Az Erasmus Kollégium Diákjainak Tanulmányai. Budapest: Erasmus Kollégium Alapítvány.
Reyneri, E. (1998). The role of the underground economy in irregular migration to Italy: cause or effect?. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 24(2): 313-331.
Rigo, E. (2007). Europa di confine. Trasformazioni della cittadinanza dell'Unione allar-gata. Roma: Meltemi.
Ruther, R. R. (2001). Christianity and the Making of the Modern Family. London: SCM Press.
Sabelli, S. (2012). Sessualità, razza, classe e migrazioni nella costruzione dell’italianità. In F. M. Cacciatore, G. Mocchi and S. Plastina (ed.) Percorsi di genere. Letteratura, Filosofia, Studi postcoloniali. Milano-Udine: Mimesis.
Sacchetto, D. (2011). Ai margini dell'Unione Europea: Spostamenti e Insediamenti a Oriente. Roma: Carocci.
Scroccaro, A. (2012). Des territoires aux territorialités multi-situées : réseaux de la pro-duction du « made in Italy » en Roumanie. Ph.D. Thesis. University of Padua
Stan, L. and Turcescu, L. (2007). Religion and Politics in Post-Communist Romania. Ox-ford: Oxford University Press.
Stan, S., Erne, R. (2014). Explaining Romanian laborlabour migration: From development gaps to development trajectories. Labor History, 55(1): 21-46.
Tamás, G. M. (2009). Un Capitalism Pur si Simplu. In A. T. Sarbu and A. Polgár (eds.) Ge-nealogii ale Postcomunismului. Cluj: Idea.
Tazzioli, M. (2013). Countermapping migration governmentality: Arab uprising and practices of migration across the Mediterranea. Ph.D. Thesis. Goldsmiths Univer-sity.
Thompson, E. P. (1963). The Making of the English Working Class. New York: Vintage Books.
Țichindeleanu, O. (2010). Towards a critical theory of postcommunism. Radical Philos-ophy, 159: 26-32.
Țichindeleanu, O. (2011). Opening towards Eastern Skins, European Masks. In F. Fanon, Piele neagră, măşti albe. Cluj: TACT.
Ukah, A. F.-K. (2005). Those Who Trade With God Never Lose : The Economies of Pente-costal Activism in Nigeria. In T. Falola (ed.) Christianity and Social Change in Af-rica : Essays in Honour of J. D. Y. Peel. Durham: Carolina Academic Press.
Van Dijk, R. (2002). The Soul is the Stranger: Ghanaian Pentecostalism and the Diasporic Contestation of 'Flow' and 'Individuality'. Culture and Religion, 3(1): 49-67.
Van Dijk, R. (2009). Social Catapulting and the Spirit of Entrepreneurialism: Migrants, Private Initiative and the Pentecostal Ethic in Botswana. In G. Huwelmeier and K. Krause (eds.) Traveling Spirits. Migrants, Markets and Mobilities. New York: Routledge.
Verdery, K. (1996). What Was Socialism, and What Comes Next?. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Vianello, A. (2009). Migrando sole. Legami transnazionali tra Ucraina e Italia. Milano: Franco Angeli.
Vianello, A. (2013). Moldovan, Romanian and Ukrainian Transnational Families Seen Through Women's Eyes. In M.-S. Alexandru, M. Nicolaescu and H. Smith (eds.) Be-tween History and Personal Narrative : East-European Women’s Stories of Migra-tion in the New Millennium. Berlin-Vienna: LIT Verlag.
Villosio, C. (2008). La situazione e la recente dinamica. In FIERI (ed.) L'immigrazione che intraprende. Nuovi attori economici in provincia di Turin. Turin: Camera di Commercio, Industria, Artigianato e Agricoltura di Turin.
Vlase, I. (2004). Hommes et femmes en migration: d'un village roumain à Rome. Migra-tion/Société, 93-94: 47-60.
Wanner, C. (2007). Communities of the Converted, Ukrainians and Global Evangelism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
Woolfson, C. (2007). Labour Standards and Labour Migration in the New Europe: Post-Communist Legacies and Perspectives. European Journal of Industrial Relations, 13(2): 199-218.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2016 Studia Universitatis Babeș-Bolyai Sociologia
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
