2019
Statelessness & Citizenship Review
I
1(1)
INTRODUCTION
The issue of stateless children is a prominent issue in Asia in the context of the
children of migrant workers stemming from restrictions on birth registration, 1 and
on access to nationality or citizenship in the host country in which their parents
work. 2 It also arises in the context of in situ populations such as the Rohingya
people in Myanmar who are denied citizenship. A large focus of measures to
address the statelessness of such children is on addressing the shortcomings of
laws that discriminate against them as de jure stateless persons under the 1954
Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons (‘1954 Convention’) which
defines statelessness in terms of lack of nationality. 3 In the European context, the
European Network on Statelessness has also identified issues around adoption and
surrogacy of children as needing attention. 4 However, problems relating to the
status of returned children of marriage migrants, which is the subject of this article,
are not currently a focus of efforts to address the statelessness of children. Whilst
our case study involved 206 ‘bi-racial’ 5 or bi-national children from 45 families,
these problems are replicated in other ‘sending’ counties in Southeast Asia,
including the Philippines. 6
Marriage migration within the Asian region has long been discussed within the
context of socio-economic conditions and the consequences for the women
involved. 7 Since the early 2000s, Vietnam has been the primary source country
for Southeast Asian marriage migrants. Every year thousands of women leave
Vietnam (primarily from the southern Mekong Delta region) for Taiwan or South
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Expert Meeting: Interpreting the 1961
Statelessness Convention and Preventing Statelessness among Children (Summary
Conclusions, 2011) <https://www.unhcr.org/4e847ecf9.pdf>.
Susan Kneebone, ‘Transnational Labour Migrants: Whose Responsibility?’ in Fiona Jenkins,
Mark Nolan and Kim Rubenstein (eds), Allegiance and Identity in a Globalised World
(Cambridge University Press 2014).
Defined as ‘individuals not considered as nationals by any State under the operation of its
law’: Convention Relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, opened for signature 28
September 1954, 360 UNTS 117 (entered into force 6 June 1960) (‘1954 Convention’). See
also Hugh Massey, ‘UNHCR and De Facto Statelessness’ (United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees, Legal and Protection Policy Research Series, March 2010) 298
<https://www.unhcr.org/protection/globalconsult/4bc2ddeb9/16-unhcr-de-factostatelessness-hugh-massey.html>.
European Network on Statelessness, No Child Should Be Stateless (Report, 2015)
<https://www.statelessness.eu/sites/www.statelessness.eu/files/ENS_NoChildStateless_final
.pdf>.
Susan Kneebone, ‘Nationality and Identity in Regulation of International Marriage Migration
in Southeast and East Asia: Children as Pawns of the State?’ (Research Paper No 734,
University
of
Melbourne,
1
August
2016)
<https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2816750>.
See Maruja M B Asis and Karen Anne S Liao (eds), Moving Portraits: Life Stories of Migrant
and Multicultural Families in Asia (Scalabrini Migration Center 2017).
Literature covering marriage migration in Asia is a diverse socio-focused research. Literature
that includes Vietnam: Melody Chia-Wen Lu and Wen-Shan Yang, ‘Introduction’ in Melody
Chia-Wen Lu and Wen-Shan Yang (eds), Asian Cross-Border Marriage Migration:
Demographic Patterns and Social Issues (Amsterdam University Press 2010); Nicole
Constable (ed), Cross-Border Marriages: Gender and Mobility in Transnational Asia
(University of Pennsylvania Press 2005); Gavin W Jones and Kamalini Ramdas (eds),
(Un)Tying the Knot: Ideal and Reality in Asian Marriage (Singapore University Press 2004).
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