Network di strada. Percorsi e strategie di sopravvivenza di un gruppo di senza dimora a Trento

Abstract

This paper analyzes the street survival strategies of a group of homeless people in Trento. Based on the results of ethnographic research, I will describe and analyze what can be defined as the main elements of the group's internal cohesion (hierarchical stratification, normative system, leadership) and the activities of the actors that develop in the group's external network. Finally, I will deal with the “death” of the group and the analysis of those crisis factors that led to its disintegration. Contrary to the conception that sees the homeless as disbanded, marginalized and disorganized actors, the picture that emerges is, instead, that of a group of actors capable of selective strategies capable of adapting to survival on the street, against the backdrop of a well-delineated normative frame of reference and under the direction of a leader who becomes indispensable for the strong internal cohesion and the very survival of the group.