Can “vital interests” of the state serve as a legal criterion for a Migration Authority to strip the nationality of citizens with dual citizenship on security and organized crime grounds? For several years, Sweden has faced significant problems with gang-related organized crime, including multiple shootings involving minors. This problem, combined with security tensions across Europe and a much stricter migration policy in Sweden, has led to the latest legislative proposal to revoke citizenship, which threatens Sweden’s vital interests. But the legal standard of seriously damaging “Sweden’s vital interests” remains very broad and thus highly susceptible to misuse. Moreover, arguably, only criminal law – with all the constitutional safeguards it affords – should carry out such a sanction. Regardless of the general trend in Europe toward similar considerations and relatively lenient international case law, there are broader questions about the practical implications of revoking citizenship that warrant discussion. For example, it may be difficult or even impossible for an individual to rescind the “other” citizenship, depending on the dual (or multiple) nationality in question.

The Proposal

The new legislative proposal in Sweden (see SOU 2026:21 and the Government bill) would allow the revocation of citizenship from individuals with dual or multiple nationalities in certain circumstances. The law proposal focuses on individuals who obtained their nationality through fraud, threat, or deception, or those with dual nationality involved in very severe criminality. I focus here on the latter: the withdrawal of Swedish citizenship from dual- or multiple-nationality perpetrators. These crimes include terrorism, murder, high treason, espionage, as well as genocide and war crimes. The legislative proposal also suggests that serious crimes committed by, and in the context of, organized crime and gang criminality that seriously threaten Sweden’s vital interests could constitute grounds for revocation, with particular focus on gang leaders. This could be seen as part of Sweden’s broader move to combat the recent surge of organized crime and gang shootings and their spread to new forms of victimization.

According to Justice Minister Strömmer, a supporter of these proposals, “violent extremism, state actors acting in a hostile manner towards Sweden, as well as systemic and organized crime” are core problems for Sweden. The focus on citizenship follows a trend in many other European countries. Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Austria, Germany, Finland, and the UK have already revoked citizenship in cases of dual nationality involving fraud in obtaining citizenship or serious criminality and security threats, such as terrorism. This European trend is often referred to as the securitization of citizenship and raises several fundamental questions about the revocation of citizenship and its implications. If revocation of citizenship in cases of dual or multiple nationality could be accepted in extreme cases, it arguably should be carried out within the framework of criminal law and the constitutional safeguards it affords, rather than through administrative procedure.

The proposed legislative revisions require an amendment to the Constitution. They would need to pass a vote in parliament with a simple majority, followed by a general election, and then a second Riksdag vote (the next general election is scheduled for September 13, 2026). Regardless of the election outcome, the proposed changes may become law, as the largest opposition party currently also supports the legislation. The law proposal is suggested to enter into force on 1 January 2027.

The legislative changes should not be seen in isolation but as part of a broader trend toward a “tough on crime” policy, a much stricter migration policy, and stricter rules for attaining Swedish citizenship. The legislative proposal also suggests revising the Swedish Citizenship Act (2001:82). These proposed changes are part of the broader narrative of strengthening the image of the state. For example, there is also a recent controversial law (not discussed in this blog post) that just passed (15 June 2026) to refuse or withdraw a residence permit in cases of serious misconduct, such as failing to follow laws, regulations, and decisions made by authorities, having large debts, or making a living in a dishonest way.

Vital Interests

Certain crimes, in certain contexts – in the legislative proposal, mostly gang violence and organized crime – are deemed so serious that they not only victimize individuals, businesses, etc., but damage or are directed against the country’s vital interests, as well. This includes security threats, as well as large-scale extortion and benefit fraud by organized crime. The current proposal does not define “vital interests,” leaving that to subsequent legislation. It supplies a guideline, referring to “systemhotande” – acts that constitute a serious threat to the national “system” or public order. From a legality perspective and strict construction of criminal law provisions, there may be several problems with the criterion of “vital interests” unless the law clarifies its meaning. According to the legislative proposal, it is necessary to not only include security here, but also crimes conducted by gang criminals who recruit minors to conduct shootings. In addition, the proposal suggests that, depending on the circumstances, extensive criminal attacks against authorities and even large-scale, systematic welfare crime can be covered by the term. There is currently no precise definition of organized crime in Swedish law. Therefore, there is an additional legislative proposal to include a definition of a criminal gang/organized crime in the Penal Code (Brottsbalken). While it is true that a state’s vital interests can shift over time, the very idea of “vital interests” is, as noted, vulnerable to overly broad interpretations and must be strictly construed and subjected to a proportionality assessment.

Citizenship Revocation Under ECHR and EU Law

According to international law, individuals who would become stateless cannot be stripped of their nationality, as stipulated in the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons, the 1961 Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, and the 1997 European Convention on Nationality. The Swedish law proposal does not aim to render anyone stateless. It applies only to persons who are also citizens of other countries. Nevertheless, revoking citizenship is obviously an extreme measure, even as a result of crimes that seriously harm a country’s “vital interests,” as the law decrees.

EU and ECHR case law offer little guidance on when someone poses a sufficient threat to security to justify the revocation of citizenship. In Wiener Landesregierung (Case C-118/20), the CJEU held that traffic offenses are not sufficiently serious to warrant revocation of citizenship and that such a measure would not be proportionate to the gravity of the offenses committed. More specifically, the CJEU stressed that the concepts of public policy and public security must be interpreted strictly, and that their scope cannot be determined unilaterally by Member States without being subject to review by EU institutions. In the Rottman case (Case C-135/08), the CJEU held that a Member State may “withdraw from a citizen of the Union the nationality of that State acquired by naturalization when that nationality was obtained by deception, on condition that the decision to withdraw observes the principle of proportionality.”

Moreover, in the context of the ECHR, in the El Aroud and Soughir case, the ECtHR held that the deprivation of citizenship from a perpetrator with dual citizenship convicted on terrorism-related charges fell within the authorities’ wide discretion and that the measures in question had been implemented in line with what is “necessary in a democratic society”. Likewise, in the Johansen case on the compatibility of citizenship revocation with Article 8 ECHR on private life, the ECtHR first examined whether the decision was taken in accordance with the law and not arbitrary, and secondly, whether it constituted an interference with private life under Article 8 ECHR. Johansen, who had dual citizenship and was born in Denmark, had left Denmark and joined ISIS. He had also lived in Tunisia for shorter periods prior to joining the terrorist organization. The ECHR examined whether the interference was proportionate and “democratic society”, necessary in a and concluded that it was. The ECHR does not, however, require states to use criminal law as the mechanism for revoking citizenship (K2 v. United Kingdom). Yet, a parallel track of having first a conviction and then an administrative decision can result in double punishment and a lack of proportionality.

Both the ECHR and EU law leave a wide margin of discretion to Member States.

Revocation As Punishment

As Gibney explains, modern denationalization relies mainly on administrative law, which has fewer legal safeguards than criminal law. In the securitization literature, the revocation of citizenship is understood as a form of securitization, in which individuals are treated as security threats, often in the context of the fight against terrorism. Maclin stresses that, in crimmigration scholarship, “denationalization extends the functionality of immigration law in advancing current penal and national security objectives through expulsion,” and that it operates without the same constitutional safeguards as in criminal law. Citizenship revocation is closely tied to migration law. As Gibney expresses it, the power to rule on citizenship is at “the apex of state power”. Shai Lavi has argued that, because citizenship revocation can be justified only in cases of dual or multiple citizenship, it can be justified only as punishment, not as an exclusion from a community. He emphasizes that revoking citizenship should only be justified by an egalitarian view of citizenship and not in cases where it targets minorities or is used in a racist way. Lavi argues that under certain circumstances, “revocation of citizenship can be justified in an egalitarian, self-governing, and deliberative democracy,” but only if subject to the stricter safeguards inherent in criminal law. To remind, ECHR went a different way: rather than a criminal sanction, revocation of citizenship can be deemed a separation between polity and offending subject, contingent on the subject not becoming stateless.

No one can be made stateless, and no actual proposal exists to make persons stateless by revoking citizenship. Still, most of the literature on the securitization of citizenship and the debate on counterterrorism law concerns the question of statelessness. Once that problem is eliminated from discourse (by restricting the doctrine of revocation only to multinationals), the question becomes: Is there an inalienable right to a specific citizenship, as opposed to the right to hold citizenship? In what extreme cases could this right be revoked for persons with multiple citizenships, thus not rendering anyone stateless but excluding them from a political community they have seriously offended? In Scandinavian history, outlawry was the severest penalty next to the death penalty that could be handed out. In contemporary Sweden, all citizens aged 18 and over are allowed to vote, including those who have committed a serious crime and been sentenced to prison. But not all other nationalities are democratic states, so revoking someone’s Swedish nationality may de facto exclude that person from a political community, even in cases of dual nationality. There are many broader questions that need to be answered here. For example, can the “other” citizenship always be rescinded by the individual, and if not, does it not create inequality in how the law is applied in practice? It is clear that the principle of proportionality is key here, so that the law respects family life (Article 8 ECHR) and that there are sufficient ties to the other country for any revocation.

It is, however, a type of law in force in the neighbouring Nordic countries (and not applicable if anyone would become stateless). In short, in Finland, revocation could be used in cases of citizenship fraud or serious crime such as high treason, spying, and terrorism. In Norway, revocation could be triggered in cases of citizenship fraud and in cases of severe harm to vital national interests. Finally, in Denmark, revocation could be actualized in cases of citizenship fraud and crimes against vital state interests, such as terrorism, high treason, and gang-related criminality.

Concluding Remarks

There are some valid points in the proposed law that address extremely severe criminality and security threats that could seriously harm the state’s vital interests. But there are also dangers, as outlined above, and these “details” could make the law unduly difficult in practice. While Sweden has a serious problem with mafia-like violent gang criminality that challenges the law’s monopoly on force and basic state structures, the criterion of serious harm to vital interests is very broad and vulnerable to misuse and will require serious attention in legislative drafting. While revocation of citizenship in extreme cases, where criminals abuse the trust and basic structures of the social contract, could be justified for people with dual or multiple nationality under certain circumstances, it should be the criminal court that decides on revocation as a punishment, in accordance with constitutional safeguards. The Migration Authority should then be responsible for investigating whether a person can actually be extradited in accordance with the principle of non-refoulement.

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