Abstract
During the transnational marriage and divorce process, couples are faced with many choices and decisions. While some couples in this study made a lot of effort to arrange the legal aspects of their marriage, most made such decisions as they went along, navigating between practical and financial concerns. This chapter shows how spouses during the transnational marriage and divorce process can develop a different legal consciousness for each legal system they get into contact with. Furthermore, it demonstrates how legal consciousness is not only informed by formal experience with the courts in the field of family law but also by other, seemingly unrelated experiences with the ‘people of the law’, such as chaotic bureaucracy, discrimination and messy procedures.
A few sections of this chapter have also been published in Sportel (2013).
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Notes
- 1.
We had just discussed my background as an anthropologist.
- 2.
Of the 26 interviews in this study, 17 were with spouses from a mixed marriage. All but one of the 11 Dutch-Egyptian divorces were mixed couples, whereas 7 of the 15 Dutch-Moroccan divorced were mixed, the others being migration marriages. Most mixed couples consisted of a Dutch woman and a Moroccan or Egyptian husband. In two cases, the husband was the Dutch partner of an Egyptian or Moroccan wife. Most migration marriages consisted of a husband who had grown up in the Netherlands and a wife who had grown up in Morocco or Egypt. In three cases out of eight the wife was the Dutch partner.
- 3.
The informant did not remember what book it was exactly. I expect it might have been the Dutch translation of the Moudawana by Berger (2004).
- 4.
- 5.
From a legal perspective, it is hard to say whether this would be an effective strategy. For example, regardless of where the marriage takes place, in both the Netherlands and Egypt, permission of the other parent is necessary to leave the country. Furthermore, being more prosperous than her husband-to-be, Monique might actually be better off financially in the Egyptian system of separate marital property and no spousal maintenance obligations for women (see Chapter 7).
- 6.
I will discuss the different types of conditions in the marriage contract, and how they were used, in Chapter 7.
- 7.
See for a more elaborate discussion of types of informal marriages in the Middle East and the Netherlands, Moors (2013).
- 8.
Especially for couples residing in the Sinai or Upper Egypt, the distance and costs involved in travelling to Cairo and taking time to do all the necessary paperwork (Kulk 2013) might involve a considerable investment of time and effort.
- 9.
A Hurghada-based lawyer I interviewed charged 50 euro for this service, but I have heard reports of others charging more.
- 10.
Approximately 13,600 euro. The 2002 currency change confused the stories of several interviewees.
- 11.
The interviewee changes between ‘he’ and ‘she’ while speaking about her Dutch lawyer. It is unclear to me whether there were two lawyers, or whether there is another explanation.
- 12.
As for marriage, mixed couples can only register their divorce at a specific office at the Ministry of Justice.
- 13.
Dwaze vaders or ‘foolish fathers’, a Dutch fathers’ rights NGO established in the 1980s. The name possibly refers to the mothers of the Plaza de Mayo; this organisation is called the dwaze moeders or ‘foolish mothers’ in Dutch.
- 14.
For Dutch residents it is obligatory to register a foreign marriage, with the exception of Egyptian `urfi marriages which are not valid in the Netherlands. Although there is only a small chance of discovery, if someone fails to do so, the consequences, for example, with regard to the paternity of children, can be severe. For the legal complexities of this issue see: Kulk (2013). However, for Dutch citizens living abroad registering a marriage or divorce in the Netherlands is optional.
- 15.
As has been explained in the introduction, I have categorised the interviewees on the basis of the country where they had been born, in addition to categorising so-called second-generation migrants as, for example, ‘Dutch-Moroccan’. Sofia’s family was originally from Europe but had already been living in Egypt for several generations before she was born. Therefore, I have qualified her as Egyptian, even though she would not necessarily agree with this category.
- 16.
This is not legally possible.
- 17.
Legally, Moroccan men do not have the right to limit their wife’s movement, nor is it possible for an Egyptian man to prohibit his (former) wife from entering all other Muslim-majority states. As will be discussed in Chapter 7, husbands can file claims at Moroccan or Egyptian courts to have their wives return to the marital home. However, the only possible sanction is the loss of maintenance rights. Also, it is no crime to divorce in another country.
- 18.
From his story, I cannot understand why the children would not have Dutch nationality since birth, as they have a Dutch mother.
- 19.
Amar did not really understand why he was expelled from the Netherlands. I have not been able to establish what happened exactly and why he lost his residence.
- 20.
I have not spoken to this interviewee since the interview in Morocco. However, indirectly I have heard that, after several years and multiple procedures, this woman indeed was able to return to the Netherlands and regain custody over her child.
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Sportel, I. (2016). The Transnational Divorce Process. In: Divorce in Transnational Families. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-34009-8_4
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