Latin American Research Review 593 Denationalization in an unlikely context Despite long-standing tensions between the DR and Haiti, several factors make it surprising that the Dominican government engaged in efforts at denationalization. The strong standing of birthright citizenship in the Americas, the comparative strength of the Inter-American human rights system, and the DR’s heavy reliance on tourism (and therefore the good will of the international community) could have been expected to inhibit the small Caribbean country from going down this path or compelled it to reverse course decisively after being criticized by international actors. Instead, the government pursued a more difficult-to-counter strategy of noncompliance through administrative obstructionism. Located in a region unique for its widespread application of automatic and unconditional birthright citizenship, the Dominican Republic’s historical observance of the jus soli principle dates back to the nineteenth century. Moreover, the American Convention on Human Rights, adopted in the western hemisphere in 1969, articulates an especially strong standard for the prevention of statelessness by stipulating that children who would otherwise be stateless must be able to acquire the nationality of the state in which they were born.3 Signatories include the Dominican Republic. Moreover, the Inter-American system is generally considered as robust and effective as international entities get. A leading proponent, Kathryn Sikkink (2017, 13), writes that “countries in the Global South, especially in Latin America and Africa, have created regional institutions to protect and promote human rights while also enforcing these rights through national court decisions. The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights have produced some of the most far-reaching decisions on human rights issues.” In her view, the interaction between civil society activists and the Inter-American system makes for an especially powerful combination (Sikkink 2017, 115). Many others, including the human rights lawyer Ariel Dulitzky (a member of the IACHR from 2001 to 2007), agree that the Inter-American system carries more authority than other regional court systems.4 Michael Camilleri and Daniella Edmonds (2017, 1) acknowledge that, while imperfect and under-resourced, “the IACHR has earned its reputation as the human rights watchdog of the Americas.”5 Finally, the Dominican Republic lacks the geopolitical weight that is often associated with audacious challenges to international human rights norms. A small country in the Caribbean, it attracts more visitors than any of its neighbors (roughly 6.5 million annually) and collects over 10 percent of its GNP through tourism. All signs indicate that it seeks to expand the tourism sector, which would make it even more susceptible to international opinion and associated sanctions. To be clear, we do not intend to offer a global statement on the effectiveness of the international human rights system.6 Rather, we draw attention to a strategy of noncompliance by which countries can sidestep human rights norms and institutions in ways that are difficult for even the most effective international legal bodies to successfully monitor and oppose, and that wear down activists and the media over time. This strategy entails purposely crafting remedies that place high administrative barriers between victims and solutions. 3 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948, Article 15) asserted that “everyone has the right to a nationality” and that “no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.” The 1954 Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons and the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness gave further expression to these principles. 4 Ariel Dulitzky, director of the Human Rights Clinic, University of Texas School of Law, interview with author, April 22, 2019, Austin, Texas, US. 5 Others, however, such as Staton and Romero (2019), acknowledge that it has an uneven record of compliance. 6 We leave that debate to others, such as Moyn (2018), Posner (2014), Sikkink (2011, 2017), and Simmons (2009). https://doi.org/10.1017/lar.2022.48 Published online by Cambridge University Press