The Impact of Gender Discrimination on Statelessness ‘strikingly absent’ in statelessness literature and research.10 This gender gap in the literature is concerning given that gender discrimination is a leading cause of statelessness worldwide and includes both direct and indirect manifestations. Most often, direct discrimination is reflected in nationality laws that discriminate against women, and includes limitations on their ability to acquire, retain, and pass on their nationality to their children and their spouses. This is a major contributor to statelessness experienced by women and children.11 Such laws reflect an entrenched patriarchal view, reinforced through colonial practices, that women’s nationality should be dependent on the male line. While less often discussed in existing literature, there are also many indirect forms of discrimination, occurring even where laws and practice are in theory gender neutral, owing to women’s often subordinate status in society that can impact women’s (and their children’s) vulnerability to statelessness, or render them effectively stateless, unable to prove their identities and nationalities.12 Recognising this understudied area in the literature, this article discusses how gender discrimination impacts statelessness, globally and with specific focus on Southern Africa, and analyses how relevant international and selected regional and domestic law and policy frameworks have responded to this issue. The article seeks to contribute to the literature in this area in two ways: first, by analysing the current literature and highlighting the need for further research on issues of gender discrimination, both direct and indirect, related to statelessness; and, secondly, by adding to the existing literature through analysis of current law and policy developments in a specific context where statelessness is a growing issue of concern, viz. Southern Africa. The region of Southern Africa, understood broadly for the purposes of this article as comprising the sixteen Southern African Development Community (SADC) members,13 is selected as the geographic focus of this article for the following reasons. As noted above, statelessness, and the risk of statelessness, is identified as a major human rights issue in this region. Further, while there is limited but growing literature on statelessness generally in this region, there are several relevant law and policy developments of interest in this area. Finally, there is limited attention to gender issues in existing statelessness literature in the region, a gap to which this article seeks to contribute. The next section discusses some of the leading causes of statelessness, arising See, for example, Laura van Waas Zahra Al-Barazi & Deirdre Brennan ‘Gender discrimination in nationality laws: Human rights pathways to gender neutrality’ in Niamh Reilly (ed) International Human Rights of Women (2019); UNHCR ‘Background Note on gender equality, nationality laws and statelessness’ (2022), available at https://www.refworld.org/ docid/6221ec1a4.html, accessed on 14 November 2022. 12 See Allison J. Petrozziello ‘(Re)producing statelessness via indirect gender discrimination: Descendants of Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic’ (2019) 57(1) International Migration 213 at 214; Betsy L. Fisher ‘Gender discrimination and statelessness in the Gulf Cooperation Council states’ (2016) 23 Michigan Journal of Gender and Law 269. 13 While there is some debate over how the region of Southern Africa is defined, the SADC member states comprise Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eswatini, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. SADC ‘Member States’, available at https://www.sadc.int/member-states#:~:text=The%20Southern%20African%20Development%20Community,Republic%20Tanzania%2C%20Zambia%20and%20Zimbabwe, accessed on 11 November 2022. 11 19