The historical development of joint custody for unmarried-parents in Germany

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26885059
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Research Field: Civil law
• Research Institution: Kagoshima University
• Principal Investigator: ABE JUNICHI 鹿児島大学, 法文教育学域法文学系, 准教授 (90735341)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-08-29 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 婚外子 / 非嫡出子 / 共同親権 / 共同配慮 / 親権 / 親の配慮 / 配慮権 / 民法

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Japanese family law does not assign joint parental responsibility to unmarried parents, even if they live together with their children. On the other hand, the German Civil Code provides joint custody system concerning children born out of wedlock (Sorgeerklaerung), which adopted through the Parentage Law Reform Act in 1997. The purpose of this study is to analyze the historical development of unmarried-parental responsibility in Germany and to propose a new approach how to introduce the corresponding system into the Japanese law. For this purpose, this study adopts a method of historical research on German family law. It is significant that the theoretical discussion preceding the introduction of unmarried-parental joint custody system into the German Civil Code was lively. It became clear that there are many important factors to determine reformation of custody system for children born out of wedlock.

Free Research Field

民事法学