no nationality, and often, they lack basic human rights. The current refugee crisis in

Syria has created thousands of stateless children, and as a result, the UN now reports that a

stateless child is born every ten minutes. But, how exactly can a person not have any

nationality? How do you become stateless?

Well, stateless people have almost no real rights, as there is no government to uphold

them. Various conventions have attempted to improve the situation, but without citizenship,

most people cannot vote, go to school, find a job, see a doctor, get married, or pretty

much anything else that requires an ID. They also see high rates of exploitation, violence,

and sexual assault.

Most people think of nationality as something you get by being born in a country, or something

you voluntarily apply. But the concept of citizenship and nationality being conveyed

upon birth is known as “jus soli”, and is not applicable everywhere. There is another

concept called “jus sanguinis”, which determines your nationality through your parents,

regardless of where you are born. The current Syrian stateless crisis is the result of “jus

sanguinis” in Syrian law. Only the father is able to designate nationality, and with

families being ripped apart, there are many Syrian children without fathers who are now

stateless.

The 1961 UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, says that children born stateless

must be allowed nationality on the territory where they are born. Unfortunately, Syria

and many other countries are not party to this convention.

In other cases, people are made stateless when their denies them citizenship due to

race or religion. In Myanmar, a long running human rights crisis has seen Rohingya Muslims

marginalized, abused, and denied citizenship on the basis of their ethnic and Muslim roots.

It is also possible for the country you’re living in to dissolve and be replaced by another

country. The new country usually encompasses the former citizens, but in rare cases people

fall through the cracks. In Europe, the collapse of the Soviet Union led to hundreds of thousands

of stateless people, some of whom lacked their original citizenship documents to apply for

new citizenship. Nomadic people, such as the Roma, also called Gypsies, have similar issues

with statelessness. That is, no original documentation. Alternately, a lack of a birth certificate

due to hospitals with poor record keeping, or being born at home can make citizenship

impossible to prove.

Those are the primary reasons for statelessness, although others exist. You can try to renounce

your citizenship, but there are limitations in place to prevent intentional statelessness.

Alternately, you can try to become a citizen of a non-state, like Liberland or Northern

Cypress. Although you technically have citizenship, it would not be internationally recognized,

and so you would be considered stateless.

For decades, the UN has worked to end statelessness, and by 2024 hopes to eradicate the legal blocks

and circumstances causing it. But for the millions left without a homeland, the legal

limbo they are trapped in provides them nearly no opportunities to get out.

Many stateless people happen to be refugees and have no home country to return to. To

learn more about the rights of refugees, watch our video at the top. You can also learn about

the stateless Roma people, sometimes called “gypsies,” at the bottom. Thanks for watching

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