One good practice of awareness raising identified by interviewees was to invite speakers with lived experience of statelessness to the events, which served as a reminder to policymakers of the real struggles that statelessness individuals face (interviewees 1, 9, 13, & 15). In this context, interviewee 15 mentioned that it would be a good idea to include more stateless people in events to raise awareness with policymakers, as it can serve as a real reminder of what is at stake. To sum up, the Platform on Statelessness has the potential to contribute to evidence engagement by drawing attention to the issue of statelessness. Participants considered this to be of particular importance, given that statelessness is not a priority on the political agenda (interviewees 11, 13, &15), and “stateless individuals are completely forgotten within the system” (interviewee 15). The Platform as a knowledge broker Besides the promotion of awareness, the Platform assumes the role of knowledge broker, thereby facilitating evidence engagement on statelessness. This is achieved, for instance, through the EMN Informs on statelessness. In this context, interviewee 15 mentioned that the EMN informs have been very instructive for actors to identify gaps and challenges around statelessness, and to figure out where to turn one’s attention to. Thus, similarly to what has been discussed in Part 2.2, the Platform brokers knowledge by acting as an information manager that collects, synthesizes, identifies gaps, and disseminates information in an accessible format for actors in need of information (e.g. Kislov et al., 2017). In addition, by collaborating with actors such as the Council of Europe, the Platform can bring evidence from practitioners working in the field on statelessness to the policy level. The latter will be exemplified through the case of the EMN and COE Multistakeholder Meeting: “Children in Statelessness” held on the 6th of June 2024 in Luxembourg. The EMN and the COE jointly act as knowledge brokers by bringing insights from experts to the policy level through the following approach: first, the EMN and the COE organize technical meetings on statelessness, which are described to be not meant to be public but aim for a “free exchange of ideas between practitioners, be they in the NGO sector or in the government sector” (interviewee 10, echoed by interviewee 13). These offer a space for networking, exchanging, and fostering personal interactions between actors in the field, which has been pointed out as highly valuable by participants (interviewees 1, 13, 15, & 16). In this context, interviewees pointed out that personal interactions at such events facilitate information sharing, especially on sensitive issues such as statelessness, by allowing participants to discuss them more freely (interviewees 13, 15, & 16). According to one stakeholder, for instance, while there is a tendency to only share superficial and vague information on cases and practices due to data protection and sensitivities around the subject, personal, face-to-face interactions can help circumvent this, and enable them to share information that they would, for instance, not be willing to share via email. 29