The Roma Center for Social Intervention and Studies (Romani CRISS) is one of the very few Roma rights organizations established in transitional countries in Central and Eastern Europe that has continued to remain active up to the present. Romani CRISS is also the only Roma organization in Romania that the United Nations has approved for consultative status with the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and was founded in 1993 by Nicolae Gheorghe and several other Roma activists with the support of the Roma Ethnic Federation (FER), the Research Center of Roma/Gypsies from the Rene Descartes University in Paris and the Sociology Institute of the Romanian Academy.

Over the past few decades, Romani CRISS has documented more than 500 cases of violations of Roma rights, some of which have been ruled on by national courts or the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). The organization initiated, and has continued to coordinate, the movement to desegregate Roma children in Romanian schools. Through litigation, research, pilot projects, teacher training, and policy and law advocacy, it has consistently opposed the placing of Roma children in separate classes and schools. To provide evidence of this practice, Romani CRISS documented over 30 cases of segregation.

Awards

The Civil Society Gala award for Defending Individual/Collective Human Rights

The ERSTE Foundation’s Recognition Award

The European Union and the United States of America’s Democracy and Civil Society Award