Résumé

Après d’abondantes réformes législatives en 2017 et 2018, les plus récents développements du droit familial allemand sont largement le fait des tribunaux. Une fois de plus, les hautes instances judiciaires agissent comme des acteurs de changement, particulièrement en présence de situations de fait pour lesquelles aucun encadrement légal n’est prévu. C’est le cas pour l’identité de genre, les parents de même sexe, la gestation pour autrui et les beaux-parents de facto. Même si certaines réformes ont vu le jour à l’égard de ces situations, il reste que de nombreux changements sociétaux fondamentaux et de transformations de la vie familiale font encore l’objet de débats et ne jouissent d’aucune reconnaissance légale.

INTRODUCTION

Following an abundance of legal reforms in 2017 and 2018, more recent developments in German family law have largely been prompted by court involvement. Once again, the highest German courts are acting as drivers for reform, particularly in instances where the law does not offer a legal framework for a number of de facto situations. This is true in relation to gender identity (Section 2), same-sex parentage (Section 3) and surrogate motherhood (Section 4) as well as for de facto step-parents (Section 5). While some legal reforms have arisen through these cases, many of the fundamental societal changes and transformations of family life are still being discussed and still lack legal recognition.

GENDER IDENTITY: OPTIONS FOR TRANSSEXUAL AND INTERSEXUAL PEOPLE

Following a landmark decision by the German Federal Constitutional Court in 2017, the German Personal Status Act (Personenstandsgesetz (PStG)) was changed, and a third legal category of gender – ‘diverse’ – was introduced. Mandatory birth registration still includes a section to define the child's gender, but it now offers the additional category of ‘diverse’ in addition to ‘female’ and ‘male’. There is also the possibility of not stating the child's gender in cases of gender variabilities, German Personal Status Act, section 22 paragraph 3. The pre-existing possibility of simply leaving this section blank if the child’s gender could not be determined as female or male was rejected by the Federal Constitutional Court as insufficient to express the person's gender identity.