Part II. European Law on Nationality and Statelessness Other instruments on nationality and statelessness Resolutions and recommendations of both the CM and the PACE on nationality and statelessness and related topics can be regularly encountered since the CoE was founded. CoE Resolutions and Recommendations: legal status CoE resolutions and recommendations have a different legal status than the treaties. They are not legally binding on the member states, whereas treaties or conventions are legally binding – though only on the states that have ratified them.581 Recommendations by the CM are, nonetheless, legal instruments that have legal significance.582 They are intended to further the aims of the CoE, and concern measures that are recommended in this light by the legislative body of the CoE. That is not to say that the resolutions and recommendations by PACE are not significant. Even though the PACE recommendations, for instance, are directed to the CM, these are – just like the PACE resolutions – of importance from a legal perspective. They signal developments in the (legal) attitude towards certain issues, as these documents contain the views and suggestions of the CoE’s deliberative body. Essentially, the instruments of the CM and PACE can be qualified as soft law.583 Given the particular significance of recommendations by the CM to the issue of statelessness, this chapter discusses mainly such recommendations. The CM has made the following recommendations on nationality and statelessness: – Recommendation on stateless nomads and nomads of undetermined nationality (1983)584; 581 582 583 584 112 Cf CoE CM Texts of a statutory character adopted by the Committee of Ministers in the course of its 8th and 9th Sessions with a view to their ultimate inclusion in a revised Statute of the Council of Europe (Strasbourg, 1951, CETS No. 008): I – Resolution adopted by the Committee of Ministers at its 8th Session (May 1951), see Powers of the Committee of Ministers, Article 15 of the Statute. That this text can be read as part of the Statute, is clarified in the details of the Statute as provided by the CoE Treaty Office, see <www.coe.int/en/web/conventions/home> accessed 26 May 2021. Grégor Puppinck, ‘Status of the Recommendations of the Committee of Ministers in the Legal Field of Council of Europe – Synthesis’ (European Centre for Law and Justice, March 27, 2012) <http://eclj. org/PDF/status-of-the-recommendations-of-the-committee-of-ministers-in-the-legal-field-of-thecouncil-of-europe%E2%80%93synthesis-english.pdf> accessed 26 May 2021. Soft law can encompass a wide range of instruments, that can at the same time “influence the course or content of international law”, cf James Crawford & Martti Koskenniemi ‘Introduction’ in James Crawford & Martti Koskenniemi (eds), The Cambridge Companion to International Law (Cambridge University Press 2012) 11. It is acknowledged by Jörg Polakiewicz that soft law-instruments have gained importance in the Council of Europe and it is even noted that their capacity to modify state behavior is sometimes “not much inferior to that of hard law instruments”. He mentions the CM recommendations as an example. See Jörg Polakiewicz, ‘Alternatives to Treaty-Making and LawMaking by Treaty and Expert Bodies in the Council of Europe’ in Rüdiger Wolfrum & Volker Röbin (eds), Developments of International Law in Treaty Making (Springer 2005) 245–290, 287. CoE CM Recommendation No. R (83) 1 of the Committee of Ministers to the Member States on the Stateless nomads and nomads of undetermined nationality (356th meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies, 22 February 1983). Intersentia