All Citizens are Created Equal, but Some are More Equal Than… 419 3 Citizenship Stripping in the Counter‑Terrorism Context: A Discriminatory Practice? Although, as the previous section has shown, ‘citizenship revocation has always been codified as States’ last right to determine their composition, the use of the practice had reached near single digits following World War II’.29 Once the legal bond of nationality has been forged, it has therefore generally come to be something to rely on—unless the citizen him or herself takes action to change citizenship and become a member of a different political community.30 But this picture has started to change as states have looked to nationality policy as a tool to tackle emerging national security threats. The evolution of ‘exceptionalist’ counter-terrorism measures has now started to penetrate the realm of citizenship, challenging ‘the prevailing view until the foreign fighter phenomenon came along [that] banishment or exile does not find a place as a matter of modern law and policy’.31 In the last decade, over a dozen countries have amended their legislation to give the state greater powers to unilaterally sever the legal bond with its own citizens on grounds that relate to national security or terrorism. These countries include Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Egypt, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Netherlands, the Seychelles, South Africa, Turkey and the United Kingdom.32 Although nationality deprivation has featured within the so-called ‘legislative fever’33 with which many governments have responded to contemporary terrorism threats, its purpose is not clearly articulated. The political rhetoric invokes notions of deterrence, prevention—in particular through blocking return—and punishment. Yet no evidence has been produced for the effectiveness of this instrument and as set out below, the idea that citizenship stripping makes society more secure or helps to protect the democratic values that terrorists have ‘turned their back on’ is deeply questionable.34 As was already the case for other rules on deprivation of nationality discussed in Sect. 2, many of these new or expanded powers do not apply equally to all citizens. In the United Kingdom, for instance, a dual national can be stripped of his or her British citizenship if this is deemed to be ‘conducive to the public good’35—a low bar that grants significant discretion to the Home Secretary, who wields the power to 29 Emphasis added. Esbrook (2016), p. 1276. In this article, Esbrook offers an insightful overview of the history of and contemporary trends in citizenship deprivation across a number of countries. See also Weil (2012). 30 The notable exception to this general trend is the persistence of large-scale denationalization and denial of nationality, affecting minority communities in a number of countries around the world, including in Myanmar, Kuwait and the Dominican Republic. See further, for instance, UNHCR (2017). 31 Burchardt and Gulati (2018), p. 13. 32 Research conducted in the context of the 2018 Expert Roundtable on Citizenship Stripping as a National Security Measure, on file with the authors. 33 Paulussen (2018). 34 Dearden (2018). 35 British Nationality Act 1981 (as amended on 28 July 2014), Sect. 40(1). 123