Statelessness in the Caribbean. Kristy A. Belton
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UNHCR’s latest activities, the Human Rights Council, which has long been silent on the issue of statelessness, has passed multiple resolutions on the right to a nationality in recent years (UN HRC 2008a, 2009c, 2010, 2012b, 2014). These resolutions encourage states to become parties to the statelessness conventions and to amend their national legislation with an eye to addressing statelessness. They also ask for cooperation among UN bodies on statelessness data collection, among other activities. The HRC also passed another resolution on birth registration (UN HRC 2015) and issued the OHCHR-UNSG report on the arbitrary deprivation of nationality via legislative and administrative means, with a special focus on childhood statelessness (UN HRC 2013b) during its 23rd Session.
The UN’s recent upsurge of interest in statelessness is also reflected regionally.61 The OAS, of which both The Bahamas and the Dominican Republic are members, held an International Meeting on Refugee Protection, Statelessness and Mixed Migratory Movements in the Americas in Brazil in 201062 and adopted the ensuing Brasilia Declaration on the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons in the Americas (UNHCR 2010a). This declaration, although primarily focused on refugees, resolves:
7. To urge countries in the Americas to consider acceding to the international instruments on statelessness, reviewing their national legislation to prevent and reduce situations of statelessness, and strengthening national mechanisms for comprehensive birth registration.
8. To promote the values of solidarity, respect, tolerance and multiculturalism, underscoring the non-political and humanitarian nature of the protection of refugees, internally displaced persons and stateless persons, and recognizing their rights and obligations as well as their positive contributions to society. (UNHCR 2010a, 3; italics in original)
The regional intergovernmental organization has passed several resolutions on the “Prevention and Reduction of Statelessness and Protection of Stateless Persons in the Americas” as well (OAS 2010, 2011, 2013b, 2014). In these resolutions, the OAS General Assembly, akin to the UN Human Rights Council, encourages member states to ratify the statelessness conventions and to amend domestic legislation to prevent and reduce statelessness. Highlighting the importance of regional education on statelessness, the OAS issued a more comprehensive resolution on statelessness, AG/RES.2826 (XLIV-O/14), in which it calls for continued training of member states representatives on the issue of statelessness. In addition to reiterating its calls to amend domestic legislation in line with international law relating to statelessness, this 2014 resolution also asks states to strengthen their civil registry systems,63 amend nationality laws to prevent and eliminate statelessness, and draft regional guidelines on the protection of stateless people. Interestingly, the OAS declares statelessness “a serious global humanitarian problem” in this resolution as well (OAS 2014, 1).
In keeping with its effort to educate governments on the issue of statelessness, the organization has created spaces for government functionaries and interested stakeholders to come together and discuss ways to move forward in addressing regional statelessness. For example, the OAS recently held a workshop on the “Fundamental Elements for Identification and Protection of Stateless Persons and Prevention and Reduction of Statelessness in the Americas,” which served as “an opportunity for participants to strengthen their awareness on the phenomenon of statelessness, as well as to [sic] the legal tools available to identify and provide protection for stateless persons, and to prevent and reduce statelessness” (OAS 2012, n. pag.).
Heeding resolution AG/RES.2826 (XLIV-O/14)’s call to draft regional guidelines on statelessness, member states of the OAS recently came together in a series of subregional meetings to revisit the Cartagena Declaration on Refugees (OAS 1984) as part of UNHCR’s Cartagena +30 process.64 From this series of meetings, the Brazil Declaration and Plan of Action for the Americas (UNHCR 2014c) was issued. Significantly, the Brazil Declaration addresses statelessness more expansively than its regional predecessor declarations, with an entire section devoted to solutions for eradicating and preventing statelessness. While it reiterates calls for member states to accede to the statelessness conventions, it also encourages them to establish SSD procedures, engage in community outreach regarding birth registration, and to restore nationality in cases where it has been arbitrarily removed, among other measures. In solidarity with the #IBelong Campaign, participating states also openly declare that they are committed to eradicating statelessness globally by 2024 (5).
While these are necessary actions to eradicate statelessness in the region (and elsewhere), there are some aspects of Chapter VI on statelessness within the Brazil Plan of Action that perhaps too closely associate statelessness with migratory movement. For example, the introductory paragraph to that Chapter says, “At the end of the next ten years, we hope to be in the position to affirm that the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean succeeded in … protect[ing] stateless persons arriving in their territories” (UNHCR 2014c, 17; italics added). It then later declares that states should “Adopt legal protection frameworks that guarantee the rights of stateless persons, in order to regulate issues such as their migratory status” (17; italics added). Finally, it calls on states to confirm the nationality of those who need it, noting that “cases of people who may require having their nationality confirmed frequently arise in situations of irregular migration or when people live in border areas” (17).
Although statelessness may arise in the context of migration, as I note earlier—and as I explain in Chapters 3 and 4—the majority of stateless persons are noncitizen insiders. They have not migrated from elsewhere. They may be the descendants of migrant parents or grandparents, but they are born and continue to reside in the countries of their birth, even though formally excluded. Associating a migratory trajectory to their predicament without clearly specifying that most stateless people are not migrants thus obfuscates the peculiar type of forced displacement they face and ignores the fact that for many of these persons, they know no other home.
Despite these promising international and regional activities around statelessness, the fulfillment of a human right to a nationality remains elusive globally. Exclusionary state practices of citizenship denial and deprivation continue to make people’s access to rights, freedoms, and protections as precarious as they were during Arendt’s time. In distinction to her time, however, the creation of stateless populations is not necessarily linked to crisis, conflict, or persecution. Thus the humanitarian element of their predicament is far from obvious to many. Furthermore, and in contrast to Arendt’s time, practices of citizenship deprivation and denial are not limited to authoritarian regimes. As I demonstrate in the next two chapters, even allegedly democratic states can act in arbitrary and discriminatory ways to forcibly displace people in situ.
PART II
Democracies as Engines of Forced Displacement
CHAPTER 3
The Bahamas: Neither Fish Nor Fowl
The social reality is that we have a very large number of persons in this society of Haitian extraction who have a very dubious status in The Bahamas; neither fish nor fowl. They don’t qualify for Bahamian citizenship constitutionally and conversely there are issues as to whether they have retained Haitian citizenship.
—former governmental official; personal interview
When we think about forced displacement, the Caribbean is not necessarily the first place that comes to mind, even though hurricanes and earthquakes do forcibly displace people within their island homes. Instead, we tend to think of the region as a prime tourist destination, a place where we can relax on the beach, play in the casinos, hike through tropical forests, visit wetlands, and an array of other such similar activities. “Paradise.” Yet for an untold number of people, this paradise has become an inferno. Far from a world of blurred boundaries, flexible citizenships, and denationalized rights, these