“No One Has Raised Their Voice in Support of the Gypsy, Who Works Honestly”: An Intersectional Analysis of Romani Activist Mária László’s Labour Agendas and Repertoires in 1950s Hungary

This article focuses on the labour activist biography of Mária László (1909–89), the first secretary general of the Cultural Association of Gypsies in Hungary (1957–61). It addresses silences in László’s activist history and examines two of her core labour agendas in the 1950s: creating employment opportunities for Roma and combating racial discrimination. Employing an intersectional perspective that considers gender, class and race/ethnicity, and drawing on recent research in feminist labour history that takes an inclusive approach to women’s labour activism, this article shows that these two agendas were inherently linked in her labour activism. It argues that László used the institutional frameworks created around the ideologies of cross-ethnic class solidarity, anti-racism and gender equality as related to the imagined emancipation of Roma and women in state-socialist Hungary to formulate her own agendas and co-operate with representatives of state institutions and Roma. The article explores these aspects of László’s activism through the concepts of negotiation and manoeuvring, and contributes both to scholarship on facets of racism in anti-racist state-socialist contexts and to the history of women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe.