Nationality

On June 11, 2025, the Hungarian Parliament passed Act XLIX of 2025 on the Suspension of Citizenship. In a previous post, reflecting on the constitutional amendment that made way for the present act, I mused about the coherence of the “suspension of citizenship,” an entirely new concept in citizenship and nationality law. In essence, I argued that the suspension of citizenship can only be an either/or concept. It is either functionally analogous to statelessness, and should therefor be evaluated as a form of citizenship revocation; or it is basically nothing at all, a form of “bull****” in Harry Frankfurt’s terms, that serves to confuse and derail discussions, but has essentially no meaning. Now we know: the suspension of citizenship is essentially a form of citizenship revocation, with the proviso that the denationalized Hungarian (ex-)citizen can automatically get their status and rights back after a decade. The crucial sanction for the suspension of Hungarian citizenship is that the “suspended” Hungarian citizen may be excluded, that is essentially deported, from the territory of…