Republic of China nationality law
| Nationality law of the Republic of China | |||||||
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| Traditional Chinese | 中華民國國籍法 | ||||||
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| Simplified Chinese | 中华民国国籍法 | ||||||
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| Standard Mandarin | |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Zhōnghuá Mínguó guójí fǎ |
The Nationality Law of the Republic of China defines and regulates nationality of the Republic of China. It was first promulgated by the Nationalist Government on February 5, 1929 and revised by the Taipei-based Legislative Yuan in 2000, 2001, and 2006.
The Act, like the Constitution of the Republic of China, makes no provision regarding citizenship. Citizenship rights in the Republic of China are currently restricted to persons with household registration in the Taiwan Area. The Act sets to define persons in terms of nationality (國籍), terming them as "nationals" (國民) rather than "citizens" (公民), a term that does not appear in the act.
Republic of China nationality generally follows jus sanguinis. The law spells out four criteria, any one of which may be met to qualify for nationality:
In the original version of the law nationality could only be passed from father to child. However, the law was revised in 2000 to allow citizenship to be passed on from either parent, taking effect on those born after February 9, 1980 (those under age 20 at the time of the promulgation).
In practice, exercise of most citizenship benefits, such as suffrage, and labour rights, requires possession of the Republic of China National Identification Card, which is only issued to persons with household registration in the Taiwan Area aged 14 and older. Note that children of ROC nationals who were born abroad are eligible for ROC passports and therefore considered to be nationals, but often they do not hold a household registration so are referred to as "unregistered nationals" in statute. These ROC nationals have no automatic right to stay in Taiwan, nor do they have working rights, voting rights, etc. In a similar fashion, some British passport holders do not have the right of abode in the UK (see British nationality law). Unregistered nationals can obtain a Republic of China National Identification Card only by settling in Taiwan for one year.
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