On December 11, the Roma Center, the Grassroots Democratic Left, and Göttingen social law attorney Sven Adam held a well-attended panel discussion on the situation of children living at Groner Landstraße 9. Our shared goal is to improve the situation of the residents and find common ground. The most important outcome of the event was the establishment of a roundtable discussion with civil society participants.
In addition to representatives from the Roma Center, the Grassroots Democratic Left, and Sven Adam, Prof. Dr. Elizabeta Jonuz and Dr. Martin Hulpke-Wette also participated in the discussion.
The Groner Landstraße 9 to 9b (GL9) residential complex regularly makes national headlines. It is primarily home to people in highly precarious living situations, including many Roma from Romania and the former Yugoslavia. Although the housing situation is extremely poor, rents are very high, even by Göttingen standards.
At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, the GL9 district made national headlines as Göttingen's second "hot spot," after residents of the Iduna Center had already been accused of spreading the coronavirus. After two residents of the GL9 district tested positive for the virus, the high-rise complex was completely sealed off and placed under police guard within a few hours. No one was allowed to leave the building.
Sven Adam had filed a lawsuit against the lockdown on behalf of residents. The Göttingen Administrative Court indeed found at the end of 2023 that the City of Göttingen had acted unlawfully in 2020. Adam subsequently filed a lawsuit for damages on behalf of 223 residents. Unfortunately, the lawsuit had to be withdrawn after two courts rejected applications for legal aid. This would have posed too great a financial risk for the residents, the law firm, and those who showed solidarity.
Dr. Hulpke-Wette is a pediatrician in Göttingen and treats many children from the GL9 district, even though his practice is relatively far away. When he learned of the lockdown, he wanted to know from the city whether the imprisoned children and their medical care were being considered. This was not the case. So he went in with an interpreter to care for the children. For example, he reported on a family of three with a one-year-old child who had a urinary tract infection. The doctor described this illness as life-threatening in such a young child. He also criticized the housing of people who were not infected with coronavirus with those who were. In individual cases, this could be fatal for such a child. He had urgently suggested that the non-infected people be housed elsewhere. However, this did not seem to be desired by the city.
Prof. Dr. Elizabeta Jonuz is a sociologist at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Hanover, where she teaches social work. She was a member of the Independent Commission on Antigypsyism (UKA), which was the first to systematically investigate racism against Roma and Sinti in Germany through studies. She scientifically assessed the treatment of Roma and Sinti in the German-speaking region, including the long history of child removal, which continues to this day, as Kenan Emini of the Roma Center later confirmed, and which is one of the reasons why the community has little trust in the institutions of the dominant population and their social workers. Jonuz addressed the "tradition" of special education for Roma children, which also continues to this day. The UKA study by Neuburger and Hinrichs highlighted the increase in racist discourse in connection with the EU's southeastern enlargement. Although the study focused on Hanover, the antigypsyist mechanisms can be found nationwide, including in Göttingen. Jonuz described the then federal government's complete unwillingness to even acknowledge institutional racism as a political scandal. She cited the 2017 National Action Plan against Racism (!): "In Germany, there is no state-organized, systematic discrimination against population groups [...]. The state institutions existing in Germany are characterized by constitutional structures and are subject to the norms of a democratic constitutional state." The following statement merely admits that discrimination can occur by individuals within state institutions. Structural and institutional racism and its functioning are negated by reference to the constitution, thus closing the eyes to reality and the state's responsibility for equality.
The treatment of the people on Groner Landstraße during the coronavirus pandemic, but also in the context of the "commitment" and raid in 2024, is precisely a prime example of institutional racism and classism. People were deprived of their freedom, placed under general suspicion, and criminalized, regardless of their personal behavior.
Annso of the Grassroots Democratic Left placed the situation in GL9 in the context of housing policy. The profit interests of investors are paramount here. The main owner of the building complex is insolvent and is failing to meet its obligations as a landlord. However, the residents and, in the case of benefit recipients, the city, are paying exorbitant rents. At the same time, the residents struggle to find alternative housing due to the stigma of their address and possibly other reasons for discrimination. The city must focus on the interests of the people who live here and on ensuring decent housing for all.
Kenan Emini of the Roma Center spoke about the precarious housing situation of Roma in Göttingen. They are the ones who have been housed in these precarious locations for years and decades, either because they were refugees and could not freely choose where to live or because they were denied alternative housing due to antigypsyism on the housing market. As a result, a disproportionately high number of Roma live in precarious housing in Göttingen, including GL9 and, even longer, the Iduna Center. The problems associated with living in these housing areas, structural and institutional racism, and stigmatization, continue to perpetuate themselves. The Roma Center has long been trying to employ community mediators, but no one is willing to fund them.
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The audience was very interested in the topic and offered many questions, suggestions, and criticisms. In the new year, the event organizers will launch a roundtable discussion with interested participants to jointly implement improvements for the children at Groner Landstraße 9.
Read our statement on the racist discourse surrounding Groner Landstraße in Göttingen: https://ran.eu.com/rumanische-roma-kinder-in-gottingen-eine-einschatzun…(Opens in a new tab/window)