'We are achieving this...Eliminating the violence and making us all Friends'. The power of friendships to generate peaceful coexistence in Sant Roc (Badalona)

Abstract

This article analyses the contribution of friendship between members of different cultures to improving peaceful coexistence in a vulnerable neighbourhood. Specifically, it analyses the personal friendship between Said, a member of the Pakistani community, andTio Antonio, amember of the Roma community, as a turning point in improvingthe coexistence in a neighbourhood which had been experiencing conflictive situations and clashes between the residents for years, especially between the Roma and the Pakistani communities. This friendship has played a mediating role and served as an example for other friendships between members of the two communities, leading to the creation of a joined organization. This analysis contributes to the existing literature, where the role of personal friendship in the transformation of conflictive intercultural relations into peaceful, constructive ones has barely been explored.