Recentering Statelessness

Senior Lecturers Marnie Lloydd and Julija Sardelić are exploring how to improve the protection of stateless people in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Kia ora. Nau mai haere mai and welcome to the Recentering Statelessness research project website, coordinated by Dr Marnie Lloydd and Dr Julija Sardelić.

This project is funded by the University Strategic Cross-Disciplinary Fund.

What is the Recentering Statelessness research project about?

The aim of the project is to understand and improve the protection of stateless people in Aotearoa New Zealand.

The project examines how statelessness in Aotearoa reflects (or diverges from) the phenomenon’s global context. Existing scholarship examines statelessness primarily from either a legal or a political science perspective. This project brings them together, breaking new ground by examining a recentering of the narrow legal definition of statelessness (being without legal citizenship status) to encompass a political one: being without a state.

Drawing on these cross-disciplinary perspectives, the project is driven by practice-based scholarship and seeks evidence-based impact. It addresses a significant research and policy gap by producing the first comprehensive report on statelessness in New Zealand. This report will highlight underexplored statelessness risks relevant for Aotearoa and the Pacific (such as climate change-induced statelessness and citizenship revocation) and provide vital data for policy change.

The project will culminate in a scientific edited volume provisionally titled ‘Recentering Statelessness’, based on an international symposium hosted at Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, convening leading global and local scholars.