As such I really don't understand the title of the post. The fact he was an American citizen had nothing to do with it. He might as well have been Egyptian, Irish or Chinese and it wouldn't have changed anything.
If you are in Finnish army then you will fight against your other country. But Finnish army doesnt allow being member of multiple armies. So if you have gone trough, as an example, US service Finnish army wont accept you. And if you go to US army after gaining rank in Finnish army you lose the Finnish rank and are just a civilian.
In this case, though, it's not that he had such an impression. It's that he didn't know he was a Korean citizen.
If draft is a social contract, what do you call a contract where one of the parties never consented to it and wasn't even aware that someone signed them up without their consent, and then the other party tries to enforce it?
But if you're born a citizen in a country with conscription, then you're underage - and thus unable to opt-out on your own, even if you could somehow afford it - until you're 18. And then they hand you the summons.
Only if you're able to obtain another citizenship. I don't think any country will allow renunciation if it leaves you stateless.
“social contract” is, at best, a very weak metaphor in any of it's uses.
"If you have some connection with another country – for example, by birth, by descent through either parent, by marriage or by residence – you may be a national of that country as well as being a British national. ... You may still have certain responsibilities with that country, such as compulsory military service."
Citizenship status should be "opt-in" not "opt-out" or "no option" at all.
If my country would enforce this (It doesn't) I should have the equal opportunity to renounce my german citizenship in favour of the iranian citizenship...
This also happens in the West as well.
And last but not least, this my opinion, I am not forcing this onto anyone -- and if I am of the opinion that this concept of "citizenship as hostage" is BS, I can make that opinion public. This touches the sovereignty of those states in no way, except when this sovereignty is enforced on people that are not part of the society of that country, and have lived 95% of their lives in another country.
In practice, most societies do not allow arbitrary individuals to choose to come and join them; immigration restrictions are a thing pretty much everywhere.
If you have lived 34/35 years in this country and came over with your parents than it is not an "arbitrary choice" you do an a whim.
But I know what you mean -- This is an idea of how [in my opinion] it should work, not the way it actually works...
"More than two decades previously, a family member — who, he’s still not sure — added his name to the family register then used in South Korea to determine citizenship, incorrectly listing his place of birth as Seoul."
This sounds to me like the Korean government made a mistake and jailed an American citizen for two years without due process. I bet with a better lawyer he could have avoided it.
If I were him I would be more angry, too.
Brazilian law, OTH, says you lose it if you voluntarily obtain another, even if you don't renounce.
Not sure I understand this. When you renounce a citizenship, you file renunciation papers with the government of the country in question. If you are abroad, you do it with the embassy if that country. Renunciation is a explicit, unambiguous legally binding step recognized by the country in question.
Once approved, you lose that citizenship. How does one still retain citizenship, assuming the renunciation succeeds?
Unless you’re talking about assumed loss of citizenship by taking on another citizenship?
Brazil, for instance, rarely does anything about it. The only case I know of is of a woman who returned to Brazil after being wanted for murder. The supreme court then ruled that she had lost her Brazilian citizenship and handed her over to the US (which they would not do were she Brazilian still).
As someone who once held multiple citizenships, I’ve learned that the only laws that count with respect to citizenship are the laws of the country of citizenship (principle of sovereignty). Whether they enforce it or not is another question, but no laws of another country apply to citizenship of a given country.
But if the crucial piece of the puzzle was what some 2nd cousin scribbled on some form in another country, it's possible that there was no way to find this out before travelling. The US lawyer would have had his US birth certificate, and given advice based on that. Could the Korean embassy grant you a letter confirming that you are not Korean? I sort-of think you'd be laughed out for asking.
The article makes it sound like living in Korea, and at the exact time some pop star was in the news for seemingly abusing privilege, was part of the reason. Although I'd be a little surprised if any bureaucrat senior enough to care about the news cycle was involved here (without knowing much about Korea).