‘We lurk in the hidden places’: The (un)stable spatialisation of Roma poverty in Romania

This article studies the urban geographies of Roma poverty by exploring variations in spatialisation. We draw on Sassen’s work on expulsions to argue that the spatialisation of poverty does not always result in a ‘ghetto’. We show instead that the ‘savage sorting’ of winners and losers and the resulting expulsions separate Roma into different levels of (housing) market worthiness. However, this sorting is also shaped by a ‘governance of Gypsy urban areas’ that enables a partial stabilisation of expulsion outcomes. We flesh out these arguments using interviews and observations collected in several Roma ghettos and slum areas from two Transylvanian mid-sized cities in Romania. Our research indicates that the spatialisation of (Roma) poverty is the result of disordering and re-ordering processes, that make it more ruthless, but at the same time politically containable.