Policy factors of gender inequalities in migration flows. The case of Romanian Roma in Italy and Spain

Abstract

Romanian migration flows knew a tremendous increase after
the fall of communism in 1989. However, Romanian citizens
didn’t participate to migration process to the same extent,
irrespective of their age, gender or ethnicity. Important inequalities affect
migrants’ profiles. This paper will highlight inequalities particularly with
respect to gender and ethnic dimensions of Romanians participating in the
process of labour migration.
Main destination countries of Romanian migrants are Italy and Spain.
These receive almost two thirds of Romanians abroad. Based on bivariate
analyses carried out on data from EU-inclusive survey 2011, it is shown that
Romanian Roma’s access to resources enabling migration after 1990 was
influenced by gender. A particular attention will be paid to the gender
inequalities among Roma migrants pertaining to differences in education,
access to jobs, and attribution of caretaking roles by virtue of their gender
norms, further revealing the vulnerability of Roma women with respect to
their access to global labour market and to social services in the destination
countries. Furthermore, policies toward immigrants also affect differently
these migrant groups across countries of destination.