The Production and Maintenance of Protracted Statelessness: An Analysis of the Language and Practice of the Nationality Law in Thailand and Brunei Darussalam

Abstract

In theory, nationality law that stipulates criteria and requirements for the granting of citizenship should address racial or ethnic division and the distinction between immigrant and indigene status. Instead, modern citizenship contradicts this, and conversely becomes an apparatus for state procedures of exclusion. In this article, I have focused on and assessed the language of seclusion and the practice of division found in the nationality law of Thailand and Brunei. I argue that the phenomenon of protracted statelessness is not happening incidentally, but rather deliberately produced through the language and practice of nationality law. The study concludes by highlighting two main factors that contribute to the increasing number of protracted stateless persons: first, the explicit and implicit language of exclusion in the law that becomes institutionalized practice; second, the opaqueness of the language used can facilitate practices that are not aligned with the law. This study sheds light on the nature of language and practice found in nationality law – a factor that has attracted little attention from relevant scholars, yet it is inherent in the production and maintenance of protracted statelessness in Thailand and Brunei Darussalam. Keywords: Brunei Darussalam, Language and practice, Nationality law, protracted statelessness, Thailand