EVALUATION OF UNHCR-LED INITIATIVES TO END STATELESSNESS – FINAL REPORT – VOLUME I UNHCR’s statelessness mandate, especially at the Ministerial Conference, around the launch of the campaign, and for the HLS. 167. The importance of the High Commissioner’s ability to access high levels in Member States and engage in diplomatic advocacy was stressed by numerous key informants, but a few noted that statelessness does not always “make it into his talking points from regional bureaux when he comes to visit a region or country” as there is no systematic sharing of talking points with the Statelessness Section or the regional statelessness officer. 168. At headquarters, the Senior Executive Team (SET) has a critical role to play in overall prioritization as well as for facilitating coordination across divisions. The Assistant High Commissioner for Protection (AHC-P) in particular has a key role, and opportunity, to set priorities for stateless work, facilitate external partnerships and to raise awareness of the importance of identifying solutions. This is even more important, according to key informants, with the ending of the Special Advisor on Statelessness position following the HLS. The Director of DIP plays a critical internal role in ensuring that statelessness is prioritized among the many different protection priorities UNHCR has to juggle on a daily basis. Many stakeholders within and outside of UNHCR felt that such prioritization was an ongoing challenge, noting that various protection functions at headquarters were better resourced and mainstreamed in UNHCR. 169. The Director of DER has responsibility for resource mobilization, campaigns, events and communications. Despite early indications that the campaign was intended to be ‘co-owned’ by DIP and DER many stakeholders felt that the campaign suffered from a lack of attention and prioritization by DER, due in part to inadequate personnel and activities budgets and focus on emergencies, as well as the lack of knowledge and comfort level to communicate about statelessness. Although DER has filled one position to support the campaign following the 2017 internal campaign assessment and created focal points for statelessness among diverse communications functions, many believed that the Division was still not fully engaged or prioritizing statelessness awareness, partnerships and resource mobilization. 170. The Assistant High Commissioner for Operations (AHC-O) oversees the RB as well as the Division of Resilience and Solutions, activities related to climate change and IDPs, and the Division of Emergency among other operational issues. The ability of UNHCR to integrate statelessness work with the broader initiatives of the Global Compact on Refugees (GCR) and with development agendas will depend upon closer coordination and collaboration between operations and protection functions at all levels. 171. The Division of Strategic Planning and Results in headquarters also serves an important role for supporting priority setting by Representatives, highlighting the importance of situation analysis across groups of PoC to inform multi-year plans, and ensuring that plans are aligned to the GSPs and follow other guidance for planning and budgeting. 172. At headquarters the key missing function for advancing statelessness objectives is that of an overall integrator and coordinator across divisions. While ostensibly the function of the SET, most key informants felt that it is unrealistic to expect the SET to serve this function effectively given the vast responsibilities a relatively small leadership team must fulfil. To address similar needs for IDPs, UNHCR established an inter-divisional working group. 173. Regional Bureau Directors are cited by stakeholders as serving a key ‘tone-setting’ function for the staff within their RB and for country operations under their responsibility. Regional Directors have major influence over allocating budget envelopes in their regions and approving COPs. In most cases key informants felt that Regional Directors were providing strong support and even engaging externally in public and policy advocacy. At the same time, they have the unenviable position of having to guide choices on which among many priorities should get attention, often in the face of major emergencies. 174. Country Representatives were found to be the most critical influencer of whether statelessness work is prioritized, to what degree it is funded and staffed, and whether operations make substantial efforts to influence government decisions, build the awareness and capacity of partners and governments, and whether politically sensitive topics should be broached publicly, privately or not at all. The familiarity of Representatives with statelessness topics and comfort level in engaging key decision-makers plays an important part in determining whether UNCHR can overcome obstacles to progress and move forward with specific initiatives on statelessness. Representatives also set the tone for all of the staff in an operation and can facilitate the work of protection officers, or when uninterested send the message that statelessness is not prioritized. 48 UNHCR / May, 2021