Statelessness

This article is about persons lacking state affiliation. For other uses, see Stateless (disambiguation).
Statelessness
Total population
4.4 million[1] (2022, est.)
Regions with significant populations
Bangladesh952,300 registered[1]
Côte d'Ivoire931,100 registered[1]
Myanmar630,000 registered[1]
Thailand574,200 registered[1]
Legal status of persons
Birthright
Nationality
Immigration

In international law, a stateless person is someone who is "not considered as a national by any state under the operation of its law".[2] Some stateless people are also refugees. However, not all refugees are stateless, and many people who are stateless have never crossed an international border.[3] At the end of 2022, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimated 4.4 million people worldwide as either stateless or of undetermined nationality, 90,800 (+2%) more than at the end of 2021.

The status of a person who might be stateless ultimately depends on the viewpoint of the state with respect to the individual or a group of people. In some cases, the state makes its view clear and explicit; in others, its viewpoint is harder to discern. In those cases, one may need to rely on prima facie evidence of the view of the state, which in turn may give rise to a presumption of statelessness.[4]

  1. ^ a b c d e "Global Trends Report 2022" (PDF). UNHCR global. Archived (PDF) from the original on October 7, 2023. Retrieved October 11, 2023.
  2. ^ Refugees, United Nations High Commissioner for. "Refworld | The 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons: Implementation within the European Union Member States and Recommendations for Harmonisation". Refworld. Archived from the original on August 12, 2021. Retrieved July 29, 2021.
  3. ^ Hovy, Bela (2011). Bhabha, Jacqueline (ed.). Human Rights and Citizenship: The Need for Better Data and What to Do about It. Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States: MIT Press. p. 90. ISBN 9780262015271. Retrieved August 11, 2014. People who reside in their country of birth, have never crossed a border, but have never had their birth registered by the state—the effectively stateless, in Jacqueline Bhabha's terminology—also resemble refugees in their relative rightlessness. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  4. ^ "De Jure Statelessness in the Real World: Applying the Prato Summary Conclusions". Open Society Foundations. Archived from the original on March 10, 2012. Retrieved November 18, 2011.