Among his first actions as re-installed president, Donald Trump issued a January 20 executive order purporting to roll back territorial birthright citizenship in the United States. Under the order, US citizenship would extend at birth only to children who have at least one citizen or permanent resident parent. Children born to unauthorised immigrants and temporary visa holders would be denied birth citizenship. Read More …
The Global Citizenship Observatory (GLOBALCIT), a global research network committed to fact-based and non-partisan analysis of citizenship laws and electoral rights around the world, is soliciting submissions for the GLOBALCIT – Rainer Bauböck 2025 Essay Award on the Global State Read More …
Since the refugee reception crisis of 2015, a host of restrictive changes to the Swedish Law on Citizenship (2001:82) have been announced by the current and previous governments. On October 1st, the first of these changes came into effect (SFS 2024:423). The amendment consists of one change to the terms of citizenship acquisition through declaration for long-term residents under the age of 21 and one change to the conditions of citizenship renunciation for people in vulnerable positions. In this short blog post, I first describe these changes and explain their immediate implications, and secondly, discuss their meaning against the backdrop of recent political developments in Sweden. Read More …
The Karta Polaka was introduced in 2007 to strengthen ties between Poland and the Polish diaspora. This status grants access to education, healthcare, and business opportunities while facilitating citizenship application. This blogpost recaps its political origins, the requirements to acquire it, the rights it grans, and some statistics on take-up rates Read More …
On 16 October 2024, Italy passed a law that would make it illegal for couples to go abroad to have a baby through an international surrogacy arrangement. The law, approved by the senate with 84 votes in favour and 58 against, would make surrogacy a “universal crime” and could fine couples up to one million euros and a two-year jail sentence. Italian lawmakers have claimed that the law is not intended to harm children but to penalise parents who have engaged in this activity. Yet, since the practice of surrogacy became illegal domestically in 2004, couples have faced an increasing number of challenges when attempting to register their children at local municipalities – affecting these children’s ability to acquire Italian citizenship. Read More …
A new political party in Germany set up by supporters of Turkish president Erdoǧan has been met with a political backlash, though similar parties in Germany were previously unsuccessful. In this blog, we discuss the motivations and candidates of this party, parallels with parties in other EU countries, and its prospects in German politics in connection with a recent citizenship reform.
In this post, Bronwen Manby discusses the events leading up to the adoption of a draft protocol by the African Union on statelessness and the right to a nationality in Africa. The post also the key provisions of the protocol on the ‘specific aspects’ of statelessness and right to a nationality.
Constitutional challenges to the stripping of Australian citizenship have been both rare, and unsuccessful, but over the last 18 months the High Court has handed down three decisions in this space. This post examines 2 of the challenges that concerned revocation due to a dis-allegiance and explores the constitutional issues that arise from these decisions.
Ius soli is seen as an immigration pull factor on the French island of Mayotte. The French government wants to amend the Constitution to abolish territorial birthright citizenship in this territory. However, this proposed reform calls into question several constitutional principles, while the effects on migration flows are questionable.
This blogpost summarises the main changes to the German Citizenship Act, pointing out important changes to the original draft during the legislative process and discusses the political responses to the Act. It also places the current reform in the context of the reforms of German citizenship law since the early 1990s, showing how German citizenship law has been increasingly liberalised. Read More …
