2021 Statelessness & Citizenship Review 3(1) Thus, in the theoretical approach taken, they highlight citizenship’s power to categorise, setting the tone of the entire volume: We approach citizenship as a mechanism of social closure… that not only differentiates between ‘citizens’ and ‘aliens’ but also draws a line between ‘desirable’ and ‘undesirable’ citizens. 7 Deirdre Troy’s chapter focuses on historically analysing the United Kingdom’s approach to citizenship revocation with an imperial perspective. She argues that ‘revocation [is] not… an exception to citizenship, but… a practice that represents the logic of citizenship — a logic that divides and codes subjects, categorizing them as desirable and undesirable’. 8 This logic of citizenship ‘simultaneously produces multiple categories alongside the citizen through practices such as immigration, revocation, naturalization’. 9 By focusing on the drafting history of the British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act 1914, 10 Troy forces the audience to look past the counterterrorism and security lens that denationalisation is positioned in today, in order to understand the unexceptional state of revocation. Denationalisation practices need to be considered in relation to immigration, naturalisation and emigration. 11 The example of the Rochdale child exploitation scandal 12 and the consequent denationalisations show the ‘broadening of the application of revocation from terrorism to criminality’. 13 Consequently, this expansion of denationalisation leads to ‘new categories [of subjects] appear[ing] each time citizenship is constituted’. 14 Troy concludes by stating that it is vital to ‘move beyond the framework of national security to both challenge given narratives about exceptionally bad citizens and examine other motivations behind revocation’s use’. 15 The third chapter by Tom L Boekestein and Gerard-René de Groot uses both a legal and normative perspective to analyse the discrimination against DutchMoroccan dual citizens and the incompatibility of Dutch denationalisation measures with the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (‘ECHR’). 16 They use this mixed approach as human rights law can only explain a certain fraction of the debate, while the normative angle allows for other aspects to be considered, especially considering the question of whether foreign fighters should be denationalised or not. 17 In the Netherlands, 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 ibid 2. Deirdre Troy, ‘Governing Imperial Citizenship: A Historical Account of Citizenship Revocation’ in Émilien Fargues, Elke Winter and Matthew J Gibney (eds), When States Take Rights Back: Citizenship Revocation and its Discontents (Routledge 2020) 11. ibid 13. ibid, citing British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act 1914 (United Kingdom). Troy (n 8) 13. The Rochdale case in Greater Manchester, United Kingdom involved multiple men sexually abusing teenaged girls. It resulted in the denationalisation of three men who had dual British and Pakistani citizenship. See Troy (n 8) 12, 22. Troy (n 8) 13. ibid 21. ibid 23. Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, opened for signature 4 November 1950, ETS No.005 (entered into force 3 September 1953). Tom L Boekestein and Gerard-René de Groot, ‘Discussing the Human Rights Limits on Loss of Citizenship: A Normative-Legal Perspective on Egalitarian Arguments Regarding Dutch Nationality Laws Targeting Dutch-Moroccans’ in Émilien Fargues, Elke Winter and Matthew J Gibney (eds), When States Take Rights Back: Citizenship Revocation and its Discontents (Routledge 2020) 26, 33. 170