Slovakia: Roma do not officially claim their ethnicity, no change expected in 2011 census

Just as in the Czech Republic, the census awaits Slovakia at the end of March 2011. Approximately 440 000 Roma people are estimated to live in Slovakia today, but they often do not officially register their ethnic affiliation as Roma. Many claim Hungarian or Slovak ethnicity, while others claim none at all out of a concern that they will be shamed or stigmatized.

Even though the number of Roma is increasing annually in Slovakia, this trend is not expected to be significantly reflected in the census results. In the 2001 census, a total of 89 920 people registered as Roma. Today their actual numbers are estimated at around 440 000, but the official numbers may end up being the same as 10 years ago.

Elena Gallová Kriglerová of the Center for Research on Ethnicity and Cultures (Centrum pro výzkum etnicity a kultury – CVEK) told the SITA agency that one of the reasons some Roma people may not register their ethnicity is that they were born during the socialist era, when Roma were not recognized as an official minority. “Therefore, they have traditionally listed Slovak nationality. Our research has shown that Roma often do not distinguish between citizenship and nationality. They live in Slovakia, so they consider themselves to be Slovaks,” Gallová Kriglerová says.

Tomáš Hrustič of the National Democratic Institute gave SITA a different opinion. He believes an important role is also played by the fact that the Roma are sill a significantly stigmatized group in Slovakia, and many of them, therefore, prefer to officially register as nationalities other than Roma, most frequently Hungarian and Slovak. “It’s not even a lie, because it is natural for many people to feel they have more than one ethnic affiliation,” Hrustič says.

Unlike Slovakia, the Czech census is making it possible to register two nationalities. “If it were possible to list more than one nationality during the census, the results concerning minorities and ethnic identities would be much more interesting and precise in Slovakia,” Hrustič told SITA.

Demographer Boris Vaňo of the Demographic Research Center does not predict the number of Roma will rise significantly during this census, but rather believes it will be approximately the same as in the past or perhaps slightly larger. He is not expecting it to correspond to reality.

Hrustič, on the other hand, believes the number of people registering as Roma will rise. He told the SITA agency that during the past 10 years, the quality of public policies concerning the Roma has risen and the number of Roma town council members and mayors at municipal level has risen. “More organizations are preparing to do outreach campaigns which could mobilize the Roma to register their ethnicity,” Hrustič noted. The census will take place in Slovakia and all other EU Member States on 25-26 March 2011.