Citizenship of women and children emanating from the marriage of an Iranian woman to a non-Iranian man through a comparative scrutiny of England Law

Female citizenship is an issue that has undergone different transformations during various legislative eras, to the extent that it has ultimately achieved independence via citizenship unity system in which the woman's citizenship is considered the same as the husband's citizenship, marriage has no effect on female citizenship, and women are entitled to acknowledge their husbands' citizenship or to retain their original citizenship. As per the legal systems of Iran and the United Kingdom, it can be concluded that unlike the above-mentioned system, Iran still complies with the theory of unity of citizenship and endorses the relative independence of citizenship merely in some cases. In contrast, in the United Kingdom as a distinguished representative of the common law system, the theory of total independence of female citizenship has been recognized for many years and the marriage of women to foreign men does not automatically change the nationality of either spouse. Furthermore, concerning the transfer of citizenship to the children, mothers and fathers can equally transfer the right to their children. However, Iranian law does not recognize the possibility of transferring Iranian citizenship via Iranian mothers and only Iranian fathers are endowed with such privilege. More importantly, the civil code does not meet the requirements of the contemporary Iranian society and requires serious revisions in this regard. The problems arisen in recent years authenticates the urgent need for these reforms.