Sinking into Statelessness 23 Unlike cultural or political organizations, membership in legal states is determined by one’s relationship, usually jus solis or jus sanguinis, to the habitable territory under that state’s control.13 Likewise, the jurisdiction of a sovereign state over an individual is determined, if not directly by citizenship, by relation to the territory which that state controls.14 Additionally, many of the essential rights of citizenship necessitate control over territory, such as the right to return.15 Finally, it is important that we distinguish the possibility that a state may exist without territory from the possibility that a sovereign non-state entity or a temporary government-in-exile may do so.16 These cases are in no way counterexamples to the principle that a state must possess habitable territory because a government-in-exile is temporary by nature and a non-state entity is, as its name suggests, not a state. 2 Continuity of State Existence This brings us to our central conundrum: the application of the principle of presumption of continuity of state existence. Here, we offer two independent lines of argument. First, the principle of presumption of continuity is mainly a limiting principle, telling against the creation of new states in the event of a 13 14 15 16 Carol Batchelor, ‘Statelessness and the Problem of Resolving Nationality Status’ (1998) 10 Int. J. Refugee Law 156, 157. See also Paul Weis, Nationality and Statelessness in International Law (Stevens and Sons 1956) 1-5; David Miller, On Nationality (2nd edn., Oxford University Press 1997) 19. For example, see the Inter-American Convention on Jurisdiction in the International Sphere for the Extraterritorial Validity of Foreign Judgements (adopted 24 May 1984, entered into force 24 December 2004) 24 I.L.M. 468. See also Miller (n. 13) 19. The ongoing debate over Palestine is an example of the importance of territory to citizenship. UNGA Dept. of Public Information, ‘General Assembly Votes Overwhelmingly to Accord Palestine ‘Non-Member Observer State’ Status in United Nations’ (2012) GA/11317. See for example Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (adopted 10 December 1948 UNGA Res. 217 A(III) UDHR). See also Weis (n. 13) 49; Thomas Baldwin, ‘The Territorial State’ in Hyman Gross and Ross Harrison (eds.) Jurisprudence: Cambridge Essays (Clarendon Press 1992); John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge 1999); Prato Conclusions para. I.9. Stefan Talmon, Recognition of Governments in International Law: With Particular Reference to Governments in Exile (Clarendon Press 1998), discussing the temporary nature of a government-in-exile. See also Daniel Philpott, ‘Sovereignty’ in Edward Zalta (ed.) Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Stanford Metaphysics Research Lab 2010). For a discussion of non-state entities, see Crawford (n. 9) 29; Brownlie (n. 9) 64. tilburg law review 19 (2014) 20-25