22 Refugee Law Initiative Working Paper 76 ultimately were successful. “This is a classic example showing what needs to be in place to enable a child’s case to be properly represented.”157 Other experts agree that family court protections should be replicated in immigration courts and tribunals. “We need to say – hey, in this very jurisdiction, here is how you [the state] are handling children in family courts, so the same respect should be given to children in this context.”158 4.3 International Obligations in Domestic Law Each jurisdiction’s law determines the parameters of litigant choice and how a stateless child’s voice will be heard. How a state incorporates human rights treaties into its domestic law plays a major role in how courts confront these issues. European states may be bound by many of the same treaties, but they may implement them differently in their societies, as noted above by Donger.159 Similarly, courts “give their own interpretation of the legal provisions involved, and take their own decision on the compatibility of the applicable national legal provision with the human rights treaty in question.”160 This paper questioned how these legal complexities could be connected to case outcomes. Almost every expert interviewed communicated some version of “it depends upon the court and what treaties the state has ratified” in response to questions concerning both procedural and substantive matters. Domestic context is important at first instance, and arguably even more so upon appeal. The farther litigation advances through a state’s court system, generally the more binding the precedent. Considering ramifications of negative precedent, decisions to appeal prove far riskier; no one wishes to detract from the legal arsenal combatting childhood statelessness. Not only the state’s legal environment, but the court itself is of utmost importance. When weighing whether to litigate, experts investigate if judges in the jurisdiction are sympathetic to issues of statelessness, or whether the court is “packed with government friends” unfriendly to migrants.161 One expert recalled a former judge who championed child rights and the welfare of all children in litigation before him. “As soon as he finished his term, it went out the window again.”162 Of the sample’s 17 jurisdictions, 13 represent European states, while the others represent the CJEU, the CRC Committee, the ECtHR, and the HRC. Setting aside the international adjudicative bodies, the sample invited exploration of certain European states’ legal environments. As there are innumerable combinations of international treaties ratified, interpreted, and implemented by a state throughout Europe, this research focused primarily on two specific areas and their effect on litigation: the CRC and the Statelessness Conventions. 4.3.1 The CRC: Lacking Domestic Power Stateless child litigants should benefit from the universal ratification of the CRC in Europe. Under CRC Article 4, “States Parties shall undertake all appropriate legislative, administrative, and other measures for the implementation” of the CRC. The CRC Committee considers one “test” of successful implementation as “whether the applicable rights are truly realized for children and can be directly invoked before the courts.”163 Although the expectation might be for states to incorporate the CRC directly into their domestic law (e.g., Sweden), some may implement the CRC by incorporating it by reference within their constitutions (e.g., The Netherlands, Serbia), and some may not take any meaningful legislative action. In some jurisdic157 Barrister (n 70). 158 Executive A (n 70). 159 Donger (n 12). 160 Venice Commission, European Commission for Democracy through Law, ‘Report on the implementation of international human rights treaties in domestic law and the role of the courts’ (10-11 October 2014), para 4 <https://www.venice.coe.int/webforms/documents/?pdf=CDL-AD(2014)036-e> accessed 17 March 2025. 161 Scholar A (n 67). 162 Barrister (n 70). 163 UN Committee on the rights of the Child (CRC Committee), ‘General Comment No. 5, General measures of implementation of the convention on the Rights of the Child’ (27 November 2003), para 21 <https://www.refworld.org/legal/general/crc/2003/en/36435> accessed 17 March 2025.