The Plight of the Rightless: Mapping and Understanding Statelessness in Tripoli-V1.3 Executive Summary Statelessness has been a recurring problem in Lebanon in general and in Tripoli in particular since the declaration of the greater State of Lebanon. Several attempts to solve this problem have taken place through the creation of the “under-study” category and naturalisation decrees including the controversial decree of 1994. However, these attempts have not succeeded in eliminating statelessness which deprives people of their right to have rights. This comprehensive study examines the root causes and consequences of statelessness and estimates the extent of the phenomenon in Tripoli. It assesses the impact of statelessness highlighting the level of deprivation and marginalization with implications on violence and radicalization. It further shows how stateless people resort to fraudulent practices as coping mechanisms which, in the light of the Syrian refugee crisis, can encourage other irregular behaviour such as violent extremism or illegal immigration. While normal citizens have access to clientelist networks and minimal citizen rights including public services, stateless people live outside all circles. They are not part of the social contract or even clientelist networks. As they do not have the right to access basic services, they resort to fraud and anti-social behaviour. Their vulnerability makes them sensitive to Violent Extremist mobilization and recruitment. On the supply side, radical groups not only have a fertile ground to recruit their members, but also have the opportunity to recruit people who legally don’t exist and are untraceable. In addition, stateless people are in such a deadlock that they can be tempted to free ride on the refugee immigration wave. As the boundaries between being undocumented and stateless status are fuzzy, smugglers can easily find some fertile ground within the stateless community. The study finally identifies projects and policy changes that can help protect stateless persons and reduce and prevent statelessness. Taking into account the highly political and controversial previous experiences, this report is an attempt to bring the topic back to a technical level. Below are the key action points identified, with ramifications both at the local and the national levels. Depoliticise the debate around statelessness through a national public communication campaign. While most studies put the number of stateless in Lebanon between 80,000 and 200,000 individuals, this study results suggests that this number is closer to 27,000 individuals distributed across the country, out of whom 2,200 reside in Tripoli. These numbers call into question the “hyper-sectarianisation” of the political discourse around statelessness, challenging mainly the demographic argument. Statelessness should instead be framed as a less politically polarising human rights issue. Give priority to the issue of statelessness through the creation of a national working group whose priority should be to commission a nationwide mapping of statelessness in order to prioritise appropriate policy options. The stateless population in Tripoli can double within 15 years, reaching more than 4,400. Delaying the resolution of the problem will consequently result in a challenge to the state on an even bigger scale. There is an immediate need for a nationwide mapping of stateless people in collaboration with the Central Administration of Statistics, with the support of the Council of Ministers and through the collection, collation and consolidation of data from various services and sectors, mainly education, security and health. This will allow to assess the situation on the national level, and particularly determine the bottlenecks. 6