Immigrants’ and descendants’ acquisition of Danish citizenship

During the last 20 years, the Danish citizenship legislation has been made more restrictive. We investigate which impact the restrictions have had on immigrants’ and their descendants’ acquisition of Danish citizenship, including whether certain groups are excluded from becoming Danish citizens, even if they are doing their utmost.

The background of the research is the European convention on nationality (1997), which requires that each state party shall provide in its internal law for the possibility of naturalisation of persons lawfully and habitually resident on its territory. In establishing the conditions, the state shall not provide for a period of residence exceeding ten years before lodging an application. In addition, the state may fix other justifiable conditions for naturalisation, in particular about integration.

Thus, it is assumed that Denmark has an accessible naturalisation arrangement for persons lawfully and habitually residing here. Moreover, Denmark must provide for facilitated acquisition of Danish citizenship for second- and third generation of immigrant descent. Denmark does not fulfil this obligation, and we examine the consequences . Statistics Denmark has granted us researcher access to their micro data, which facilitates our register-based research.