SOLVING STATELESSNESS As an initial matter, we note that the relative paucity of attention to statelessness in human rights practice sits uneasily alongside U.S. Chief Justice Earl Warren’s famous description of the right to nationality as the “right to have rights”.8 As a “foundational right” that fundamentally affects the ability to enjoy the full range of political, economic and social rights, the right to nationality should be a natural focus of attention and concern by the UN’s human rights mechanisms. And yet while there are many thematic resolutions at the UN Human Rights Council that are run on regular cycles - relating to freedom of expression, the protection of human rights while countering terrorism, and human trafficking, to name only a few - there is no such thematic resolution on statelessness. The first resolution on the right to nationality was passed by the Human Rights Council in 2012 and the topic was not taken up again in a dedicated resolution until 2016. The 2016 right to nationality resolution calls for an inter-sessional workshop, and it is possible that this resolution will lead to more regular thematic follow up. There are also other resolutions that are relevant to addressing statelessness, most notably the thematic resolutions on arbitrary deprivation of nationality and on birth registration, that could be strengthened and made more complementary with one another as part of a more coordinated effort based on the current level of interest in the issue. In order to understand the relatively limited attention that statelessness has received to date, it is important to bear in mind that the right to nationality, although clearly set out in numerous human rights instruments, touches on highly sensitive matters of State sovereignty. Questions of membership, that is to say, questions pertaining to who exactly belongs to the “imagined community” that is the State, to use Benedict Anderson’s famous phrasing, go to the very core of a State’s being and are critical to the never-ending process by which States define themselves as distinct from others. The current global displacement crisis has made these questions more profound, as have contemporary concerns about security and terrorism. Moreover, matters of inclusion and exclusion are intimately related to power and domination by certain groups over others. Indeed discrimination remains the most significant cause of statelessness in the world today. For example, the 27 States that do not allow women to pass nationality to their children on an equal basis with men perpetuate statelessness, 8 USA Supreme Court, Perez v. Brownell, 31 March 1958, 356 U.S. 44. 15