Statelessness Working Paper Series No. 2015/01 1. Introduction Since the 1990s, UNHCR1, academic articles, and NGO publications have worked to identify causes of statelessness including state succession, arbitrary deprivation of nationality, inadequate civil registration systems and gender discrimination in nationality law.2 This article contributes to that discussion by explaining in greater detail how gender discrimination in civil status and civil registration law, not just nationality law, can generate statelessness. Gender discrimination in civil registration law impedes women’s ability to register their children’s births, particularly when children are born outside of wedlock. Discrimination against women and non-marital children also limits avenues to verify the paternity of non-marital children.3 Further, governmental restrictions that prevent citizens from marrying foreigners can lead to statelessness because children born to forbidden unions may be treated as non-marital children and create a risk of statelessness. Children born in the Middle East to unmarried parents or to parents with unrecognized unions are at an increased risk of statelessness.4 This article explores how children can become stateless as a result of gender and birth status discrimination beyond nationality law. It focuses on one region where de jure discrimination on the basis of gender and birth status is prominent, namely the six countries of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC): Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). UNHCR and its global partners have embarked on an ambitious and praiseworthy plan to end statelessness by 2024.5 Action 3 of UNHCR’s plan aims to “[r]emove gender discrimination from nationality laws,” while Action 7 aims to “[e]nsure birth registration for the prevention of statelessness.”6 This article demonstrates that gender discrimination is a problem in at least some countries in the world in civil registration and civil status law; ensuring universal registration will require the international community to address gender discrimination in a variety of legal sources beyond nationality law. In sum, this article hopes to promote UNHCR’s goal of ending statelessness by 2024 by explaining more deeply the causes of statelessness. 2. Statelessness in GCC States Citizenship is the legal bond between an individual and the state.7 Due to extravagant oil wealth throughout GCC countries, citizens receive generous social benefits. As a result, citizens are likely to oppose expanding the nation’s citizenry since doing so dilutes resources amongst a greater pool of beneficiaries. The six GCC states have long hosted populations of stateless persons who are generally 1 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. 2 See, e.g., UNHCR, GLOBAL ACTION PLAN TO END STATELESSNESS, (2014), 1, http://www.unhcr.org/54621bf49.html (aiming to end statelessness caused by gender discrimination, discriminatory denationalization, state succession, migration, lack of birth registration, etc.) ; A Edwards and L van Waas, (eds.), Nationality and Statelessness under International Law, (2014) (including chapters that address statelessness caused by gender discrimination, discriminatory denationalization, state succession, and migration); WOMEN'S REFUGEE COMMISSION, OUR MOTHERLAND, OUR COUNTRY: GENDER DISCRIMINATION AND STATELESSNESS IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA (June 2013), http://www.refworld.org/docid/ 51c02a084.html (discussing gender discrimination in nationality law as a major cause of statelessness in the Middle East); Z Albarazi and L van Waas, ‘Towards the Abolition of Gender Discrimination in Nationality Laws’, (2014) 46 FMR (advocating for reform of discriminatory nationality laws as a tool to reduce new causes of statelessness). 3 I use the term “non-marital children” to refer to children whose parents were not married at the children’s birth rather than the pejorative term “illegitimate children.” 4 Betsy Fisher, Why Non-Marital Children in the MENA Region Face a Risk of Statelessness, (2015) Harvard Hum. Rights J. Online, http://harvardhrj.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Fisher_HRJ_01-05-15.pdf Discrimination on the basis of birth status refers to discrimination against children who are born out of wedlock. 5 UNHCR, GLOBAL ACTION PLAN TO END STATELESSNESS, (2014), http://www.unhcr.org/54621bf49.html 6 Ibid. at 1. 7 European Convention on Nationality, art. 2(a), Nov. 6, 1997, E.T.S. No. 166 (“‘nationality’ means the legal bond between a person and a State…”) 1