Rethinking Statelessness from Within identity and opportunities that citizenship provides.67 Those experiencing rooted displacement are tethered to their country of residence, but endure the harms we tend to associate with displacement or migratory contexts. That is, they remain ‘physically rooted in the countries of their birth’ while simultaneously experiencing a loss of access to basic rights, economic hardships and restricted life opportunities, and feelings of limbo or unbelonging.68 For my purposes, I utilise Belton’s concept of rooted displacement as a further indicator of de facto statelessness specific to the non-migratory context. Per the first reason listed, even when thoughtfully incorporating Black histories into migration, citizenship and statelessness studies, theorising can often replicate issues of overemphasising legalistic over de facto statelessness. For instance, Belton herself foregrounds those who are not legally recognised in the place of their birth, referencing those of Haitian descent in the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas.69 Similarly, Fabios Santos, in his 2025 article The Necropolitics of Statelessness that I reference throughout this article, also specifically focusses on the 1937 Parsley Massacre and the 2013 La Sentencia ruling which forced many individuals of Haitian descent in the Dominican Republic into statelessness or potential de jure statelessness.70 Though both are incredibly useful for exploring the Haitian experience abroad, we learn more about how Haitians abroad may experience rooted displacement and statelessness, and little about the experiences of those within Haiti itself in relation to these concepts. This is why I lean on Belton’s notion of rooted displacement, as though it can potentially replicate the dominant focus on de jure statelessness, it is useful in providing a perspective outside the scope of migration as the precipitating event for statelessness. With Belton’s exploration of rooted displacement in mind, the harms of community loss, isolation and a loss of rights, all while being located in one’s place of birth can help form a more nuanced image of de facto stateless I situate amongst Haiti’s populace. Like those without citizenship cited by Belton, I argue that the precarious existence of the everyday citizen in Haiti represents an apt example of rooted displacement, and thus de facto statelessness. By taking the concept of rooted displacement and utilising it in the intra-Haitian context, value is added to the existing frameworks by providing a refreshed understanding of the civil and public denigration of life within Haiti as a result of centuries of coloniality. B Functioning Citizenship Since, per Arendt, the de facto stateless are without effective citizenship,71 it is necessary to define what effective citizenship entails. There has been ongoing debate on whether to frame citizenship as either a ‘legal status, as a system of rights, as a form of political activity, or as a form of identity and solidarity’,72 or some combination of these. Citizenship to Arendt meant an execution of one’s will in the public realm, actively and continuously effectuated to enable the creation of 67 68 69 70 71 72 ibid 916–7 (emphasis in original). ibid 908. ibid 907. Santos (n 5). Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (n 3) 374–5. Linda Bosniak, ‘Citizenship Denationalized (The State of Citizenship Symposium)’ (2000) 7(2) Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 447, 452. 137