What about it is unclear? I mean I was born here

Ungeklärte Staatsangehörigkeit and the (re-)production of de facto statelessness in Germany

Bibliographic Data

ID4525604
AuthorsMargarida Farinha (0000-0003-2283-3647, University of Amsterdam, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume26
Issue6
Pages799-815
Publication date2022-08-18
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueCitizenship Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1362-1025 • E-ISSN: 1469-3593
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13621025.2022.2103972
OpenAlexW4288042026
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited32

This paper examines the administrative category ‘ungeklärte Staatsangehörigkeit’ (‘unclear nationality’) and its implications for citizenship rights in Germany. An unclear nationality represents a de facto statelessness but does not concede the rights established for de jure stateless people. It impedes naturalization in Germany and complicates access to a travel document and settlement permit. The paper analyses the (re-)production of unclear nationality and traces its effects on the life of a woman born in Germany with an unclear nationality since birth. Her experiences disclose the difficulty of navigating the German bureaucratic system and its discretionary power. Her experiences also reveal how a state of limbo is perpetuated over generations, confining individuals in a territory whose bureaucratic apparatus views them as foreign. Unclear nationality thus functions as a technology of exclusion: by placing the person in a yet-to-be determined nationality, it interpellates them not as subjects of rights but objects of clarification

Bureaucracy · Citizenship · De facto · Geography · German · Immigration · Nationality · Naturalization · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Statelessness · Diaspora, migration, transnational identity · Law · Migration and Labor Dynamics · Migration, Refugees, and Integration

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