“Between the Earth and the Sky”: Does International Criminal Law Adequately Address the Arbitrary Deprivation of Nationality of the World’s Most Invisible People?

Abstract

Statelessness has been described as the phenomenon of existing “between the earth and the sky”. Those rendered stateless risk persecution from public officials and private citizens, and are denied the rights associated with nationality including accessing: health, education, work, social welfare and the right to freedom of movement. While it is an issue of global proportions, stateless people remain among the world’s most invisible people. This invisibility is perhaps assisted by the fact that the world’s stateless are not spread evenly across the globe. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) there are no stateless people in New Zealand. The phenomenon of statelessness is unfamiliar and largely unknown in this country. Limited research has been conducted on the relationship between statelessness and international criminal law (ICL). This is particularly surprising given the close links between statelessness and some of the most horrific acts of the twentieth century. In this paper I will address whether ICL adequately addresses statelessness caused by the arbitrary deprivation of nationality.