Is the Civil Solidarity Pact the Future of Marriage? The Several Meanings of the French Civil Union

Rault, Wilfried

doi:10.1093/lawfam/ebz001

Cited by 8 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 14 publications

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“…Registered cohabitation enjoys general social acceptance and considerable institutional support; it does not seem to be viewed antithetical to marriage. Further, the majority of first-registered cohabitation episodes in Iceland are followed by the transition to marriage—unlike the French PACS that is rather considered an alternative to marriage (Heuveline and Timberlake 2004; Rault 2019 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Nation of Bastards? Registered Cohabitation, Childbearing, and First-Marriage Formation in Iceland, 1994–2013

Jónsson

2020

Eur J Population

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Nowhere in Europe is extramarital childbearing more pervasive than in Iceland. Roughly, 70% of children born in 2018 were conceived outside of marriage, thereof 83% of firstborn, which, on the surface, puts Iceland at the vanguard of a development often associated with a second demographic transition. In this study, we investigate the union formation behaviour of Icelandic women during a period of 20 years (1994-2013) with the objectives of gaining insight into the interplay of childbearing, registered cohabitation, and marriage and to enhance our understanding of the function of registered cohabitation in the family-building process. We use administrative population register data, covering the childbearing and marital history of the total female population born in Iceland during 1962-1997. The data are analysed by means of event history techniques and presented as annual indices of first-registered cohabitation and first-marriage formation, respectively. We find indications of forceful postponement of registering cohabitation over time, but a stable portion of around 80% of women registered cohabitation before any first marriage or age 46. Around 70% of women married before age 46, and the standardized marriage rates remained relatively stable during most of our study period. Our findings suggest that within a context such as the Icelandic one, most people tend to marry, regardless of the prevalence of cohabitation. We propose that registered cohabitation should be seen as providing a semi-regulated union status for prospective parents in relation to childbearing. Marriage on the other hand could be seen as providing an elevated union status to couples.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Nation of Bastards? Registered Cohabitation, Childbearing, and First-Marriage Formation in Iceland, 1994–2013

Jónsson

2020

Eur J Population

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“…It proved a big success among opposite-sex couples, so that today there are almost as many such civil unions in France as there are marriages: in 2017, between persons of opposite sex, 187,000 civil unions and 227,000 marriages were registered. There are several likely reasons for this rise (Rault 2019). For some couples, a pacs is different from marriage but does not prevent them from marrying in the future, while for others, it is an alternative form of union which has none of the connotations we mentioned earlier.…”

Section: Beyond Marriagementioning

confidence: 96%

Postface. After Legal Recognition

Rault

2020

European Studies of Population

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This postscript highlights the key features of this book, especially its combination of different approaches using legal, demographic and sociological analysis tools, and the comparative perspective that is present throughout. The approach is particularly useful, because the three disciplines that structure the book do not view same-sex families in the same way. Another strand in the book is a more direct reflection on marriage. While marriage has been the symbol of the recognition of sexual minorities in recent years, the book shows that it cannot fully embody it, and invites us to think "beyond marriage". The last part of this postscript will suggest research themes that could usefully be investigated, provided that suitable tools are used-particularly the tools of quantitative sociology, since the social and scientific visibility of same-sex parenthood does not always mean statistical visibility. Keywords Same-sex couples • LGBT families • Europe • Marriage • Methods Research on same-sex parenthood has been going on in Europe for some 30 years. The trend owes much to the movement for political, legal and social recognition that began in the Scandinavian countries in the late 1980s, starting with Denmark in 1989. It then spread to most countries of Western Europe, taking different forms in different countries, and is now emerging in some East European countries. Although most of the earliest provisions recognizing same-sex unions, such as registered partnerships and civil unions, included no provision for filiation and parentage, it was due to them that same-sex-parented families (called "same-sex families") were included in the political agenda and gradually became objects of study in the social sciences. But these kinds of family were not new. Lack of legal recognition and a term to call them by never prevented LGBT families from existing. They were "nameless families" in the words of Pierre Bourdieu (1996)-low-visibility families.

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“…Moreover, entering into a PACS requires less paperwork than marriage and can be unilaterally broken by one of the partners who simply sends a notarised letter to the court. As a result of these advantages and low cost, different‐sex couples have increasingly preferred the PACS (Rault 2019). For example, in 2016 there were 410,495 different‐sex couples who formalised their unions, of which 44.4 per cent of these were PACSed and 55.6 per cent were married 1.…”

Section: French Marriage and Adoption Laws And Their Effect On Gay An...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Licence required: French lesbian parents confront the obligation to marry in order to establish kinship

Stambolis‐Ruhstorfer¹,

Descoutures²

2020

Int Social Sci J

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Before 2013, French children could not have two parents of the same sex. For example, non‐biologically related mothers in lesbian couples were legally invisible and prohibited to use second‐parent adoption. A 2013 bill legalising same‐sex marriage and adoption authorised that option. However, this reform requires same‐sex couples – but not heterosexual couples – to marry before establishing parental rights. Given this inequality, we ask: compared to their heterosexual peers, do French same‐sex couples with children marry more often? What do they think about same‐sex marriage in general and their own marriages in particular? To answer these questions, we draw on survey responses and interviews from the first national cohort study of French same‐sex couples, most of whom are lesbian, raising children born between 2011 and 2013 (n = 162). We find significantly higher marriage rates among same‐sex parents compared to different‐sex parents. What may appear at first glance to be an unvarnished attachment to marriage is belied by discriminatory logics requiring couples to go against their stated ambivalence towards the institution of marriage in order to safeguard their parental rights. We argue that this burden is a form of legal violence that enforces heterosexist norms through legislation that was ostensibly enacted in the name of equality.

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Is the Civil Solidarity Pact the Future of Marriage? The Several Meanings of the French Civil Union

Cited by 8 publications

References 14 publications

A Nation of Bastards? Registered Cohabitation, Childbearing, and First-Marriage Formation in Iceland, 1994–2013

A Nation of Bastards? Registered Cohabitation, Childbearing, and First-Marriage Formation in Iceland, 1994–2013

Postface. After Legal Recognition

Licence required: French lesbian parents confront the obligation to marry in order to establish kinship

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