38.2 (7) TEMPROSA.DOCX38.2 (7) TEMPROSA.DOCX (DO NOT DELETE) 256 BERKELEY JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW 1/16/2021 12:59 PM [Vol. 38:2 accepts it as the definition of statelessness. 90 As we shall see later, authorities around the world increasingly recognize the definition—but with variations— whether in pronouncements as to the content of the law, or in judicial and administrative decisions and opinions on statelessness determinations. Legal scholars likewise endorse the definition. Guy Goodwin-Gill, for instance, referred to the definition as a description of the stateless person in international law. 91 Alice Edwards has taken the position that the definition is descriptive of the situation of de jure stateless persons. 92 Laura van Waas submits that it is the official and internationally endorsed definition of statelessness. 93 Interpretations of the Definition of Statelessness The literature on legal statelessness prescribes at least two standard interpretations of the statelessness definition. This Section highlights the two top-line approaches, according to competing schools of thought on the matter in legal literature. The idea that there are largely only two ways to interpret the definition is the orthodox view in international law. However, interpretation in international law is a rhetorical enterprise, which involves matters of choice and of values and can enable us to generate new insights. 94 The First Approach The first approach regards the definition as purely objective: a person is stateless if no State considers them a national under its law. 95 The value is put on what the domestic laws of the relevant States provide. A person claiming stateless status must prove that no State recognizes them as a national. 96 According to this 90. See INTER-PARLIAMENTARY UNION, NATIONALITY AND STATELESSNESS: A HANDBOOK FOR PARLIAMENTARIANS (2005). 91. See Guy Goodwin-Gill, Stateless Persons and Protection Under the 1951 Convention (or Refugees, Beware of Academic Error!) 4 (1992), http://repository.forcedmigration.org/show_metadata.jsp?pid=fmo:979 (last visited Apr. 16, 2019) (referring to the definition in response to James Hathaway's position on stateless status vis-à-vis refugees). 92. Alice Edwards, Displacement, Statelessness, and Questions of Gender Equality and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, Background Paper for a Joint UNHCR and United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women Seminar, held at the United Nations in New York, Jul. 16–17, 2009, at 17 (Apr. 2009); see also Carol Batchelor, Statelessness and the Problem of Resolving Nationality Status, 10 INT'L J. REFUGEE L. 156, 171 (1998) (Article 1 contains a description of statelessness). 93. VAN WAAS, supra note 51, at 228 (Mark Manly's position seems to reflect van Waas's stand on the issue). 94. Ian Scobbie, Rhetoric, Persuasion, and Interpretation in International Law, in INTERPRETATION IN INTERNATIONAL LAW 71, 75 (Andrea Bianchi, Daniel Peat & Matthew Windsor eds., 2015) (For instance: "should one argue that the text is clear in the light of the treaty's object and purpose; or should it be read in the light of the parties' subsequent practice; or that recourse should be made to the travaux préparatoires to clarify matters?"). 95. ROBINSON, supra note 48. 96. Id.