Heather Alexander is an expert on nationality law, citizenship, and human rights. She is currently the lead researcher of the Centre for the Future of Citizenship, a research network and think tank focusing on the intersection between citizenship and technology.

She received a PhD in law from Tilburg University in 2020.

Heather has ten years of experience as researcher and consultant in Côte d'Ivoire, Australia, Gabon, Chad, Sri Lanka, Kosovo and the United States with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Carleton University, the University of Melbourne, the European University Institute and the US State Department. She began her career as a US Peace Corps Volunteer.

Heather was a founding board member of United Stateless, an advocacy network for stateless people in the United States, and is currently a board member of the Canadian Centre on Statelessness. She is a member in good standing of the District of Columbia Bar Association. She is also proficient in French.

Publications:

Gender and Statelessness in Bjorkquist et al vs. Attorney General of Canada (forthcoming, Statelessness and Citizenship Review).

The Nationality and Statelessness of Nomadic Peoples Under International Law, book in press with Oxford University Press.

Keeping Statelessness on the Agenda at the Global Refugee Forum and Beyond, Statelessness and Citizenship Review 6(1), 137-142 (2024).

Identité juridique et préservation du nomadisme comme mode de vie : les hommes Foulbé en Côte d’Ivoire (online).

Those Fleeing States Destroyed by Climate Change Are Convention Refugees (with Jonathan Simon) Biblioteca della libertà (2024).

Review of “Statelessness Determination Procedures and the Right to a Nationality: Nigeria in Comparative Perspective,” By Solomon Oseghale Momoh, Book Review, Statelessness and Citizenship Review Special Issue.

The United Nations and Robot Rights, Comment, Canadian Journal of Law and Technology, 20 Can. J. L. & Tech. 257 (2023).

Mentoring new voices in forced migration publishing, 70 Forced Migration Review (2022) (with James Milner and Alice Philip).

The Duty to End Statelessness Derives from Sovereignty: a Metaphysical Analysis (with Jonathan Simon; forthcoming).

The Ethics of Counting Statelessness, in ‘Statelessness, Governance, and the Problem of Citizenship’ T. Bloom and L. N. Kingston, eds, Manchester UP, (2021).

Nomads and the Struggle for a Legal Identity, 2 Statelessness and Citizenship Rev. 338 (2020).

The U.S. Supreme Court in ‘Sessions v. Morales-Santana’: Preventing Statelessness for Children Born Abroad, 1(2) Statelessness and Citizenship Review 330 (2019).

"The Open Sky or a Brick and Mortar School? Statelessness, Education and Nomadic Children," World's Stateless Report, Institute on Statelessness and Inclusion, (2017)

"No Port, No Passport: Why Submerged States Can Have No Nationals," Wash. Int'l L. J. 26.2 (2017) (with Jonathan Simon)

"'Unable to Return' in the 1951 Refugee Convention: Stateless Refugees and Climate Change," 26 Fl. J. of Int'l L. 531 (2014) (with Jonathan Simon) 

"Sinking Into Statelessness," 19 Tilburg U. L. Rev. 20 (2014) (with Jonathan Simon)

"Justice for Rwanda: Toward a Universal Law of Armed Conflict," 34 Golden Gate U. L. Rev. (2004) 

Other:

Grâce aux nouvelles technologies de communication, la lutte contre l'apatridie est de plus en plus portée par les personnes concernées, et pas seulement par des experts, (August 23, 2022, Société québécoise de droit international)

Her Erdős Number is 6.