Family law

Family law (also called matrimonial law) is an area of the law that deals with family matters and domestic relations, including:

• marriage, civil unions, and domestic partnerships;
• adoption and surrogacy
• child abuse and child abduction
• the termination of relationships and ancillary matters, including divorce, annulment, property settlements, alimony, child custody and visitation, child support and alimony awards.
• juvenile adjudication
• paternity testing and paternity fraud

This list is not exhaustive and varies depending on jurisdiction. In many jurisdictions in the United States, the family courts see the most crowded dockets. Litigants representative of all social and economic classes are parties within the system.

For the conflict of laws elements dealing with transnational and interstate issues, see marriage (conflict), divorce (conflict) and nullity (conflict).

See also

• Alimony
• California Child Actor's Bill, or the Coogan Law
• Merger doctrine (family law)
• Paternity fraud
• Supervised visitation

Specific jurisdictions

• Algerian Family Code
• Family Court of Australia
  • Australian family law
• Family Law Act (Alberta, Canada)
• Family law system in England and Wales
  • Children Act of 1989
• Malian Family Code
• Mudawana, the Moroccan Family Code
• The Philippines' Family Code of 1987
• Nashim, the order of the Mishnah outlining Jewish family law

Further reading

• Sorge, J. & Scurlock, J. (2014). Divorce Corp: The Divorce Industry Explosed, book and video.
• Testimony of Barbara DaFoe Whitehead, Ph.D, Co-Director, National Marriage Project Rutgers University, before US Senate Subcommitee
• Wallerstein, Judith, Ph.D., "The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce", an analysis of the long-term effect of divorce on children; NPR interview (2001)
• R. Partain, "Comparative Family Law, Korean Family Law, and the Missing Definitions of Family", (2012) HongIk University Journal of Law, Vol. 13, No. 2.
• Vaious works by Professor Carol Smart.

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