YALE HUMAN RIGHTS & DEVELOPMENT L.J. 2017] The Risk of Statelessness VOL. XIX 93 protection to “stateless persons.” At the same time, the Court’s decision points to an area of the law of statelessness where there is significant room for interpretation, namely in the statelessness determination procedure itself. The UNHCR has issued guidelines for such determinations, and a number of states have begun to implement statelessness determination procedures at the national level. The UNHCR’s Handbook on the Protection of Stateless Persons provides guidance on evidentiary considerations and suggests that the appropriate standard of proof for demonstrating that a person is stateless is a “reasonable degree” of certainty, as opposed to absolute certainty. This standard for demonstrating that a person is stateless for purposes of international law protection is still open to interpretation, and this is where the Inter-American Court should focus in order to advance its concern for those at risk of statelessness. It should do so by retaining well-understood rules of statelessness protection, and developing transparent and well-reasoned standards for protection. A “reasonable degree” of certainty in the context of statelessness protection means that a person would be more likely than not stateless if she were left unprotected. This standard is drawn from the fundamental nature of the right to nationality, and the fact that a person has nationality or is stateless, and there is no status in between. Because everyone must have a nationality, the likelihood of statelessness should never be permitted to exceed the likelihood that one is a national. Accordingly, one should be a “stateless person” under international law if it is more likely than not that she will not be considered a national under the operation of the laws of any country. Like all such standards, there are many evidentiary questions that must be resolved and much room for judicial interpretation. Such is the work that lies ahead for the international community and domestic jurisdictions around the globe. The Inter-American Court, however, did not engage with these pressing questions in its decision in Expelled Dominicans and Haitians. Rather, the Court declared that the state had the burden to demonstrate that Dominican-born persons of Haitian descent could derive Haitian nationality, and when the state did not resolve the Court’s concerns about the risk of statelessness, it extended the protection of the international law of statelessness. Presumably, some large segment of Dominican-born persons of Haitian descent are covered by this ruling of the Inter-American Court, but the regional community has no way of knowing who these individuals are, or what the limits of this protection might be. The need for clarity in this area is evident in the Dominican Republic and beyond. Inhabitants of the island of Hispaniola continue to reel from the latest decision of the Dominican Constitutional Court to reinterpret its Constitution and remove the basis for nationality of more than 130,000 people. Legislation that restored nationality for some, and opened a temporary path to naturalization for others, still left tens of thousands of people without Dominican nationality and at risk of statelessness.291 If the 291. See SAIS Int’l Human Rights Clinic, supra note 142, at 35; see also Ley No. 169-14 que Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3111529