On the Outside

The Roma, Europe’s largest minority, have suffered prejudice and persecution since first arriving on the continent in the 14th century. Successive waves of Roma have migrated from Eastern to Western Europe. Written records suggest my home country of Sweden received its first Roma migrants in 1512. Another westward movement followed the abolition of Roma slavery in Romania in the 1850s and 1860s. Sweden is currently receiving a fresh wave of Roma, originating mainly from Romania and Bulgaria. Driving this latest movement is prejudice against Roma people and a lack of opportunities in their home countries. The accession of Romania and Bulgaria to the European Union in 2007 opened borders and enabled the Roma to wander more widely in Europe. Virtually every Swedish town now has East European Roma beggars or musicians sitting outside grocery stores and shopping centers. During the berry-picking season, Roma people, mainly from Bulgaria, set up temporary camps in the forests of central and northern Sweden, where they harvest blueberries and lingonberries for sale to middlemen who resell them to food companies. The series On the Outside is part of an ongoing, self-assigned project that aims to shine a spotlight on the Roma and help create a better understanding of the position of this underprivileged group in European society. The series deals with borders and boundaries, with being on the outside of society, with traveling across national borders to find better prospects, and, at the end, with making the final crossing, the one from life to death.