4 Refugee Law Initiative Working Paper 76 This paper’s initial hypothesis was that strategic litigation choices – such as representation structure – made within certain jurisdictions determine a child’s level of ability to protect himself/herself from statelessness. The research intended to reveal what those elements were, and how they operated against the legal backdrop of European states. Employing a qualitative legal research methodology, this research assessed European judicial decisions concerning childhood statelessness supplemented by unstructured interviews with legal experts who provided candid context.