All’ombra del baobab. Rifugiati, emergenza e considerazioni sul dono alla periferia di Roma

Displaced people, fleeing conflicts and coming to Europe from the Balkan or from the Central Mediterranean routes in search of some sort of asylum, often face the impossibility to match the country of their dreams with the country of their permanence. This is partly due to the still in force Dublin III Treaty, which places severe limits on their movements. As a result of such a policy, many European capital cities are forced to house emergency camps – illegal, provisional and intra-territorial – which become at the same time the recipients of constant police clearance intervention and of bottomup reception models. In the present essay, the authors lay their eyes on one of these camps located on the outskirts of Rome, following its vicissitudes during almost three years, and focusing specifically on the hospitality model, set forth by a group of volunteers, called Baobab Experience. A major question leads the research: what is the sense of food – which is collected, cooked, and distributed by volunteers – for who donates and for whom receives the donation? Ethnographic material – drawn from observation, participation, interviews and photoeliciting – prompts the authors to look at the Gift system, studied by Marcel Mauss and by other scholars, as a possible interpretative key.