Kälin and Kochenov's
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Kälin and Kochenov’s An Objective Ranking of the Nationalities of the World Kälin and Kochenov’s Quality of Nationality Index (QNI) is designed to rank the objective value of world nationalities, as legal statuses of attachment to states, approached from the perspec- tive of empowering mobile individuals interested in taking control of their lives. The QNI looks beyond simple visa-free tourist or business travel and takes a number of other crucial factors into account: those that make one nationality a better legal status through which to develop your talents and business than another. This edition provides the state of the quality of nationalities in the world as of the fall of 2018. Edited by Dimitry Kochenov and Justin Lindeboom Part 1 Laying Down the Base By Dimitry Kochenov and Justin Lindeboom 10 • Quality of Nationality Index 1 The QNI’s Task: Demystifying Citizenship through Clear Data The demystifi cation and deromanticization of citizenships and nationalities is long overdue (Kochenov and Lindeboom 2017; Kochenov 2019a). Although much ink is spilled in the literature about concrete citizenships’ ‘values’, ‘identities’, and ‘honor’ when speaking about citizenship, two fundamental starting points — which underpin the QNI — should always be kept in mind. Firstly, as a historically sexist and racist ‘status of being’ randomly assigned by an authority, any citizenship is inevitably arbitrary, messy, and complex. Crucially, it never depends on an individu- al’s wishes: the authority will decide who is a citizen no matter what his or her ‘identity’ or ‘values’ may be (Kochenov 2019b). Those who think that a parent’s ‘blood’ or the fact of birth in a particular territory is suffi cient justifi cation for the distribution of the crucial rights and entitlements that shape our lives can probably stop reading here: this book is not a neo-feudal nationalist restate- ment of citizenship’s glory — it is anti-feudal. Among the fi rst premises of looking at nationalities critically — replacing nationalist mantras with objective data — is the belief that it is wrong to judge people by the color of their passports rather than by their values, education, or any other factors related to their personality, talents, and achievements. This is the key paradox of contemporary citizenship: in a world where the belief in equal human worth is the key starting point of thinking about justice, citizenship is ab initio on the losing side (Carens 2013). The second starting point is a consequence of the fi rst. The random distribution of rights and life chances would not be such a problem if discrepancies among the different possible outcomes of the ‘birthright lottery’ were minimal (Shachar 2009). Because this is not the case, however, the idealized concept of ‘separate but equal’ citizenship does not work (Spiro 2019a). The Basotho, Kyrgyzstanis, and Nicaraguans know this very well, as do the Austrians, Canadians, and New Zealanders, who are among the lottery’s winners. Citizenship’s random nature notwithstanding, it 1 The QNI’s Task: Demystifying Citizenship through Clear Data • 11 is extremely important to hold a ‘good’ national- ity since the determinant of global inequality is Russian Denmark Central African now geography, not class, as was primarily the Federation Human Republic case in the past (Milanovic 2016); on average, Development the poorest Danes are richer and live longer Weight of Economic and more rewarding lives than the most well- Travel Freedom Strength off Central Africans. This volume’s visualizations of the world, which are a special contribution by Ben Hennig and Diversity Peace and Dimitris Ballas, make this point abundantly of Travel Stability clear: money travels with the most elite Freedom passports, while the majority of the world’s population lives with substandard-quality nationalities at best. Because what all citizen- Weight of Diversity of Settlement Freedom Settlement Freedom ships around the world have in common is the right to be admitted to particular places, citizen- ship — from an instrument of rights-proliferation and protection — has become the fundamental tool of policing and reinforcing global inequality. Central African Republic citizenship is a status that will not grant you many visas. It will more than likely ensure that you will never join the Danes or even the Russians and will die where you are. In comparison, Danish nationals can choose to settle and work without question in 43 of the richest countries and territories in the world, never facing, by virtue of their citizenship status, the problems that frame the lives of citizens of the Central African Republic. In modern times, being admitted to desirable parts of the world — made possible only by possess- ing a requisite citizenship — is fundamental to all aspects of one’s life: medical care, education, wealth, and basic freedom all depend on citizenship, which is randomly ascribed at birth. The elementary raison d’être of the QNI is thus to debunk three central mythologies that surround our current ‘separate but equal’ thinking about citizenship and nationality, which are derived from black letter public international law and echo the mantras regarding the sovereign equality of states (Sironi 2013), as well as traditional philosophical and sociological analyses of what citizenship and nationality are and stand for (Marshall 1977). Kyrgyzstan Canada Nicaragua New Zealand Human Human Development Development Weight of Economic Weight of Economic Travel Freedom Strength Travel Freedom Strength Diversity Peace and Diversity Peace and of Travel Stability of Travel Stability Freedom Freedom Weight of Diversity of Weight of Diversity of Settlement Freedom Settlement Freedom Settlement Freedom Settlement Freedom 12 • Quality of Nationality Index The QNI demonstrates that at least three Austria Lesotho familiar myths informing our thinking about Human citizenship and nationality could not be fur- Development ther from the truth. The fi rst myth is that all Weight of Economic nationalities are equal, and that it is impos- Travel Freedom Strength sible to compare them because attachment to a country cannot be objectively measured, which reinforces the narrative that ‘separate but equal’ works. The QNI shows beyond any reasonable doubt that it does not, since com- Diversity Peace and of Travel Stability paring the key rights associated with different Freedom nationalities reveals huge discrepancies in their quality. The second myth is that there is a direct correlation between the power and the size of a Weight of Diversity of country’s economy and the quality of its nation- Settlement Freedom Settlement Freedom ality. This line of thinking is equally misguided: the QNI demonstrates that the nationalities of the world’s most militarily and economically powerful countries cannot compare in quality to those of some microstates. The third myth, on which democratic justifi cations for upholding the ‘separate but equal’ status quo rest, holds that there is a correlation between the geographical scope of the rights granted by a nationality and the territory of the conferring state. The research informing the QNI demonstrates clearly that this correlation, which was true in the past, does not exist in the 21st century. Some nationalities grant access to key citizenship rights, including the right to work and reside in the territories of dozens more countries than those granting China Malta Liechtenstein Russian the status in the fi rst place. Some examples Human Federation Development are visualized on the map on pages 30 and 31. In helping debunk these three mythologies Weight of Economic Travel Freedom Strength the QNI opens a Pandora’s box of questions, some of which are discussed below and also in Dimitry Kochenov’s Citizenship (Kochenov 2019b). Diversity Peace and Once citizenship is thoroughly scrutinized, it is of Travel Stability Freedom evident that the above three mythologies, and many others, are deeply entrenched in how we think about nationality and citizenship and interfere with our capacity to perceive the data Weight of Diversity of Settlement Freedom Settlement Freedom showing that each of them has proven to be false. This counterintuitive twist makes the QNI particularly interesting. 2 What Is Citizenship or Nationality? • 13 2 What Is Citizenship or Nationality? The idea of measuring and comparing nationalities sounds odd if we believe in the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) description of nationality as a legal bond having as its basis a social fact of attachment, a genuine connection of existence, interests and sentiments, together with the existence of reciprocal rights and duties. It may be said to constitute the juridical expression of the fact that the individual upon whom it is conferred, either directly by the law or as the result of an act of the authorities, is in fact more closely con- nected with the population of the State conferring nationality than with that of any other State.1. It is a relief to know that the contemporary reality of citizenship and nationality is far removed from this romantic vision (Spiro 2019b). In Nottebohm, not fi nding ‘genuine links’ allowed the ICJ to endorse robbing a former German of his extensive Guatemalan possessions after the Second World War as a consequence of his naturalization in Liechtenstein, a neutral and prosperous European state, rather than in Guatemala, where he lived most of his adult life. Liechtenstein was not allowed to protect its citizen since the legal link of nationality