2011] AN INTERNATIONAL LAW OF CITIZENSHIP 721 The issue of citizenship acquisition arises in the contexts of state succession and migration. The boundary instabilities of the post–Cold War era, with its multitude of new states in central and eastern Europe, gave rise to significant controversies relating to citizenship practice. Regional institutions launched vigorous human rights critiques of the citizenship regimes of these states, which resulted in reformed policies.169 Not merely an extension of norms against statelessness,170 this activity broke from previous practice by imposing upon particular states (namely, states of residence) a duty to grant access to citizenship.171 The International Law Commission’s Draft Articles on Nationality of Natural Persons in Relation to the Succession of States works from human rights premises.172 The draft articles would establish a presumption in favor of nationality on the basis of habitual residence. The articles would also provide that states shall not deny persons “the right to retain or acquire a nationality or the right of option upon the succession of States by discriminating on any ground.”173 A norm so framed seems consistent with recent state practice.174 In the context of state succession perhaps more than any other, international human rights norms are being incorporated into state practices relating to citizenship. But this human rights framework has also been applied in the context of migrant populations, suggesting a norm that habitual residents, from birth or not, may not be arbitrarily denied access to citizenship.175 In the context of both state succession and migration, antidiscrimination norms supply an important baseline. As noted above, the fact that citizenship practices are bracketed in the Racial Discrimination Convention demonstrated citizenship’s exceptional modern insulation from international law. More recent practice under the Convention, however, suggests an evolving approach. Although the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination 169 See, e.g., Orentlicher, supra note 155, at 299 (“these assessments capture in microcosm the evolution across decades of legal paradigms governing citizenship determinations by states”); see also Steven R. Ratner, Does International Law Matter in Preventing Ethnic Conflict?, 32 N.Y.U. J. INT’L L & POL. 591, 630 –33 (2000) (describing interaction of Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe high commissioner on national minorities and Latvia regarding citizenship acquisition by Russian minority). 170 See VAN WAAS, supra note 106, ch. 6. 171 In this respect, “access to citizenship” differs from a “right to nationality” in the sense that the latter is satisfied by the holding of any nationality. See, e.g., Chan, supra note 106, at 13 (characterizing the “negative form” of “right to have a nationality” as “the right to be protected from statelessness”). 172 Draft Articles on Nationality of Natural Persons in Relation to the Succession of States, supra note 154; see ZIEMELE, supra note 139, at 210 –16; see also Convention on the Avoidance of Statelessness in Relation to State Succession, May 19, 2006, ETS No. 200, at http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/EN/Treaties/Html/200.htm. 173 Draft Articles on Nationality of Natural Persons in Relation to the Succession of States, supra note 154, pmbl., Art. 15; see also European Commission for Democracy Through Law (Venice Commission), Declaration on the Consequences of State Succession for the Nationality of Natural Persons, COE Doc. CDL-INF(1997)001 (Feb. 10, 1997), at http://www.venice.coe.int/docs/1997/CDL-INF%281997%29001-e.asp; European Convention on the Avoidance of Statelessness in Relation to State Succession, supra note 172. 174 See Orentlicher, supra note 155, at 300. Decades ago, Brownlie asserted a norm under which habitual residents would, under international law, acquire nationality in a successor state. See Brownlie, supra note 14, at 320 – 24. But see 1 DANIEL P. O’CONNELL, 1 STATE SUCCESSION IN MUNICIPAL AND INTERNATIONAL LAW 503 (1967) (“it cannot be asserted with any measure of confidence that international law, at least in its present stage of development, imposes any duty on the successor State to grant nationality”); WEIS, supra note 13, at 149 (“it may be said that there is no rule under which nationals of the predecessor State acquire the nationality of the successor State”). 175 See, e.g., Michael Autem, The European Convention on Nationality: Is a European Code of Nationality Possible?, in TRENDS AND DEVELOPMENTS IN NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL LAW ON NATIONALITY, supra note 159, at 19, 32 (“lawful and habitual residence is no longer considered as one of the conditions that has to be fulfilled for acquiring the nationality of a State Party, but almost as a ground for becoming entitled to the right to acquire that nationality”). 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