Leave no one behind is the central, transformative promise of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and its Sustainable Development Goals applicable to all UN Member States. Yet, one of the most severe inequalities is lacking citizenship of any state which prevents those affected from claiming many rights, including education, health, banking and employment. We do not know how many people in the world are stateless, it is certainly millions, and mainly impacts people living in the countries where they were born. As the roll-out of legal identity and civil registration across the world gathers momentum, many will not be able to gain proof of nationality or be able register their family’s vital events because of it. Those who know they are stateless tend to be reluctant to identify themselves as such to data collectors, and are also likely to be absent from both surveys and administrative data which is increasingly the basis of official statistics. A group of experts working under the EGRISS umbrella, which previously produced the UNSC endorsed international frameworks for refugee and IDP statistics, is currently working on the development of International Recommendations on Statelessness Statistics (IROSS).
An on-line talk and discussion about Statelessness and the many challenges statisticians face in trying to quanitify it. The talk will cover a) definitions and examples of statelessness; b) the implications of being stateless c) the role of the UNHCR; d) statistical gaps and issues around filling them; and e) national and international statistical efforts.
Mary Strode
Between 2016 and 2021 Mary worked for UNHCR as the senior consultant to the Expert Group on Refugee, Internally Displaced Persons and Statelessness Statistics (EGRISS) by providing professional and drafting support for a series of international recommendations on displacement statistics and on statelessness. Mary is a survey statistician by background with extensive experience of living conditions and household surveys in developing countries. Initially working for DFID she provided long-term technical support to countries, then was later seconded to OECD in 1999 to establish the PARIS21 initiative. In 2003 she joined Oxford Policy Management where she headed the Official Statistics Portfolio and managed the team providing support to the Rwanda living conditions survey and population census over the period 2003 to 2015. She also supported statistical modernisation strategies in many countries including Ethiopia, Kyrgyzstan, South Africa, Liberia, Barbados and the Gambia. In South Africa she also supported the development of a statistical quality assessment framework (SASQAF) and instruments for coordinating the national statistical system. She has also evaluated programmes providing support to statistical capacity building by the UN system, DFID, Sweden and EU
Radha Govil
Senior Legal Officer (Statelessness) in the Division of International Protection at UNHCR, where she has worked on issues relating to nationality and statelessness since 2010. Radha has helped to develop UNHCR doctrine and policy on statelessness in a number of areas, including in relation to the definition of a stateless person under international law and the implementation framework for the #IBelong Campaign to End Statelessness
Phil Crook for RSS International Development Section