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An Open Access edition of this book is available on the Liverpool University Press website and the OAPEN library. This book, designed as a resource for scholars, educators, activists and non-specialist readers, presents the results of new research on the role of Romani groups in European culture and society since the nineteenth century. Its specific focus is on the ways in which Romani actors, in their interactions with non-Romanies, have contributed to shaping Europe's public spaces. Twelve chapters recount the experiences and accomplishments of individuals and families, from across Europe (England, France, Spain, Germany, Poland, Hungary, Romania and Finland) and Canada. All based on new research, and maintaining a focus on the real lives and activities of Romani people rather than on the perspective of the majority societies, these studies exemplify the creative presence of Romani people in the fields of politics, economics and culture. We see them as writers, artists and performers, political activists and resistance fighters, traders and entrepreneurs, circus and cinema managers and purveyors of popular science. Sensitive to the ambivalent position from which Roma act, the cases are linked and contextualized by a general introduction and by section introductions written by leading scholars of Romani studies with expertise in history, ethnography, musicology, literary and discourse studies and visual culture. The volume is richly illustrated, including many images that have never been published before, and includes an extensive bibliography / guide to further reading. Contributors to the volume: Begoña Barrera, Beatriz Carrillo de los Reyes, Malte Gasche, Paweł Lechowski, Anna G. Piotrowska, Laurence Prempain, Juan Pro, Eve Rosenhaft, Carolina García Sanz, María Sierra, and Tamara West.

Medio millón de gitanos europeos fueron exterminados por el régimen nazi; muchos más fueron sometidos a una política de discriminación racial similar a la sufrida por el pueblo judío. Sin embargo, la persecución y el tormento de los gitanos en la Europa de Hitler tiene poca presencia en los libros de historia. La tendencia a ignorar el genocidio romaní refleja la pervivencia de un antigitanismo cotidiano que estuvo en la base del racismo extremo del nazismo. Es por ello urgente conocer la historia del holocausto gitano. Este libro la sitúa en el contexto de la violencia generalizada de la Segunda Guerra Mundial al tiempo que ofrece una explicación que la inscribe en una trayectoria más amplia de persecución antigitana en las sociedades modernas. Esta es una historia marcada por la separación y destrucción de familias, la esterilización de adultos y niños, la expoliación de bienes y privación de medios de vida, el trabajo esclavo, los experimentos médicos, el horror de los campos de exterminio y el asesinato en masa, todo ello por el hecho de ser gitanos. Frente a la negación del reconocimiento como víctimas del nazismo una vez acabada la guerra, es crucial escuchar la voz de los supervivientes y conocer su lucha por el derecho a la memoria.

En la actualidad, la mediación está cobrando un enorme protagonismo como método alternativo para la resolución de conflictos en todos los ámbitos de la sociedad (familiar, civil y mercantil, vecinal, escolar, políticos y también internacionales). Como no podía ser de otro modo, también ha ganado peso en los sistemas penal y penitenciario español, habiéndose creado una importante corriente doctrinal y judicial que pretende potenciar la justicia restaurativa, en lugar de la retributiva que había sido la dominante hasta hace pocos años. La justicia restaurativa parte de la víctima y de sus intereses, pero los hace confluir con los del victimario y con los de la sociedad en general; todos conjuntamente podrán contribuir a fortalecer la credibilidad de la norma penal mediante el restablecimiento del diálogo social que el delito quebró. La mediación en el ámbito penitenciario pretende también reducir la existencia de conflictos interpersonales en las cárceles, donde la situación dada por la privación de libertad, la falta de intimidad y la estrecha convivencia a menudo confluyen en roces y tensiones entre los internos.

Can citizenship rights be denied to significant groups in a society that regards itself as civilized and self-governing? Is it possible to exclude such people in the name of freedom and reason? Is it plausible to explain classifications that differentiate between first- and second-class citizens as “natural”?This is the paradox inherent in modern politics, born of the revolutions that ended the Ancien Régime in the western world. Throughout the nineteenth century and at the beginning of the twentieth, liberalism inspired a representative form of government that appealed to citizenship, yet marginalized many social groups, including natives, women, immigrants, workers, slaves and nomads. In the Hispanic dimension of the Atlantic world that this book deals with, modern politics was based on exclusions explained as natural and necessary. In both Europe and America, a distinction was made between the responsible citizen and those “others” in society, potential “enemies within”, who had to be controlled and supervised.This book explains the success of this political operation by analysing the historical construction of figures of alterity that were fundamental to the definition of national civic identities. Its basic premise is that imaginaries that were constructed in the nineteenth century can be found even today in western political conceptions. The cultural complexity of enduring political images is revealed by exploring the inner workings of virtuous figures in relation to their opposites: readers will find the mosaic of representations of civic alterity both recognisable and surprising.The contributors to this volume provide historical perspectives on the debate on political legitimacy in open societies. Reinventing democracies involves understanding the historicity of inherited formulae of governance and considering them, therefore, as amenable to improvement. The readiness to do this is not a threat to democracy but, rather, a commitment to looking for it.