Chronicles of ordinary racism 2011 - Cronache di ordinario razzismo

nationality still prevail over others, such as mutual assistance within a group of people
from the same country.
In the past, particularly during the ‘90s, this manner of communal living seemed like it
might evolve into more mature and diversified types of association (cultural, political,
athletic, based on voluntary work and so forth). The rapid transformations that have
characterised the world of immigration in recent years, together with the dowturn
which has affected immigrants’ living conditions and the failure of many projects that
marked the first phase, between the end of the ‘80s and the beginning of the ‘90s,
ensured that the spread of opportunities remained contained within certain limits.
However, several meaningful initiatives arose in newly devised areas of intervention.
Readers may recall, for example, the foreign youth who, referring both to their
countries of origin and, more frequently, to their status of Italians in every way except
by law, initiated various communal experiences, albeit fragile, as is the case with most
associations built up around young people. It is necessary to pay close attention to this
ever‐changing world, promoting its growth and development by means of specific
projects and resources. We need only think, for example, of the initiative carried out by
the Emilia Romagna region to allow young people of foreign origin to participate in the
regional civil service scheme.
Strong commitment is also essential in the field of women’s associations, wich already
operate today but have not so far proved hugely successful, to prevent female
emancipation and the condition of foreign women, young or otherwise, from remaining
trapped between a public portrayal linked to cultural anti‐immigrant and anti‐Islamic
stereotypes and a forced isolation, fuelled by the social and institutional discrimination
that impacts foreign families.
The projects undertaken recently or in the past, as well as the various forms of assembly
that can be encountered within the social environments already frequented by
immigrants (places of gathering, either formal or informal, with all their possible
ramifications), must be encouraged with targeted policies and the use of public
resources, in such a way as to invest in the future of our democracy.
Social organizations, at least in part, are also trying to assist the process of participation
and association undertaken by immigrants, admittedly with many limitations and
contradictions. We are dealing with a complex task that requires a structural change in
the manner in which individual initiative is promoted and community leaders are
selected. In this like in other areas, immigration gives rise to questions that concern all
of us, because the space for participation, indipendence and personal achievement
within social organizations is often limited and regimented.
It is necessary to promote initiatives aimed at revitalizing the area by creating dynamic
and pluralist relationships and, in this way, inventing new outlets for the personal
development of foreigners, within collective projects aimed solely at achieving these
goals.
In order to reach such important targets, it is may also prove necessary for the
organizations to shed some of their old habits and, above all, to revise procedures,
timing and mechanisms that help to create the spaces which can be filled by new
community leaders.
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