UNHCR, Statistical Reporting, and the Representation of Stateless People 89 may be formed. In the cases discussed, we note how statist and technocratic biases have privileged national sources as “reliable,” even as some states have engaged in efforts to redefine membership based on exclusive understandings of nationality. Such biases are not new: As Dunlop recorded almost ten years ago, the use of resultsbased management tools favored states over other beneficiaries, above all those who fell under its protection mandate.86 In addition, UNHCR’s tendency to limit reporting on statelessness to de jure stateless populations – until very recently – may have encouraged a process of methodological revisionism where the numbers of stateless people in need of protection were rounded down. Narrowing legal definitions logically leads to undercounting. As argued earlier, it is potentially a fallacious assumption that individuals and groups that may be experiencing persecution from a particular state and may have had their nationality withdrawn should then have their claims affirmed by the state in question. It is perverse to suggest that such states might be called upon to record the presence of these stateless people and remedy their situation. Even when states have grappled with the issues of statelessness and demonstrated a commitment to examine claims, a heavy evidentiary burden still falls on individual applicants. Even though statelessness determination procedures were introduced in the United Kingdom in 2013, additional rules have been designed that disadvantage applicants. In 201987 and again in 2020, the UK Immigration Rules were amended to include further requirements, such as the obligation to obtain a residence permit in the United Kingdom. The new rules still require a stateless applicant to have “sought and failed to obtain or re-establish their nationality with the appropriate authorities of the relevant country.”88 As the case studies of the Kashmiri children and Teh record, seeking status on the basis of a claim to being stateless is far from straightforward. How UNHCR identifies those under its statelessness mandate remains contentious. As recorded earlier, there was a tendency to take large numbers of people out of the category of statelessness by excluding de facto stateless individuals. Now, there is a shift to aggregate de jure and de facto stateless people as well as those with indeterminate nationality. While this might make reporting simpler, it does not inform our understanding of why these people are stateless and how their plight may be corrected. There are many broader possible explanations for UNHCR’s attachment to such practices, which complement Reichel’s notion of normative path dependency 86 Dunlop, Indications of Progress. See House of Commons, “Statement of Changes in Immigration Rules” (October 24, 2019), https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/ file/841772/CCS001_CCS1019317048–001_Statement_of_changes_in_Immigration_Rules_ Text.pdf. 88 See “Immigration Rules Part 14: Stateless Persons” (June 4, 2020), www.gov.uk/guidance/ immigration-rules/immigration-rules-part-14-stateless-persons. 87 https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108914994 Published online by Cambridge University Press