从比较法角度看继父母子女关系

The Relationship between Stepparents and Stepchildren in a Comparative Context

现代社会 ,离婚率的上升是一个普遍的现象。因离婚而带来的新型家庭模式———重组家庭 ,在许多国家已成为一个亟待法律规制的社会问题。由于重组家庭中的“父母”与“子女”关系 (即继父母与继子女关系 )具有复杂性 ,如何调整他们之间的权利义务关系 ,各国的立法与实践存在差异。一般来说 ,普通法国家对重组家庭中的“父母”与“子女”间的关系采宽松主义 ,法官和立法者通过扩大“父母”的法律概念的做法 ,将那些实际上起着“父母”作用的人纳入“父母”的范畴 ,并在他们之间创设了法律上的权利和义务。而大陆法国家则采严格主义 ,对继父母子女关系的形成规定了严格的条件 ,并将继父母与生父母的法律地位加以区分 ,继父母与继子女之间仅具有有限的权利和义务。尽管如此 ,最大程度地保护重组家庭中儿童的权益 ,仍然是国际社会和各国立法的一致目标。

Today, it is a worldwide phenomenon that the number of stepfamily has been largely growing with the increasing percentage of divorce. The laws dealing with these stepfamily relations are different from country to country. Generally, the law governing stepfamily gives such parents-like individuals and children extensive rights and duties in common law system, but obligations of stepparents arise only through legal marriage and a married stepparents and stepchild receive certain fixed rights and obligations in codified-legal system. However, the aim of the laws governing stepfamily is to protect the rights of child in reconstituted family.