Abstract
Divorcing couples may receive support and advice from their networks, friends and family, and they may also get into contact with all kinds of professionals providing legal or social aid. Complicated legal issues related to transnational divorce, such as the involvement of migration law, may require specific forms of support from both professionals as well as private networks. While the concept of social capital has strong positive connotations, I aim to demonstrate how the support of private and professional actors can also entail constraints. As will become clear in this chapter, this is due to the production and enforcement of norms on, for example, conducting a transnational marriage or handling the law in transnational divorce. These norms are created in transnational legal space.
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Notes
- 1.
For a more elaborate discussion of transnational ties, distance, and emotional and practical support and care, see also the work of Baldassar (2007).
- 2.
Annual report (Jaarverslag) SSR 2008. The majority of these requests dealt with social security issues of Moroccans who have returned to Morocco after a period of residence in the Netherlands.
- 3.
The office was reopened later that year, by former employee Mohamed Sayem as an independent office. At the time of writing it was not clear what would happen to the Steunpunt after Sayed passed away in May 2016.
- 4.
This prevalence of SSR clients might be an overrepresentation as I have approached most—though certainly not all—of these respondents through their office in Berkane. I have also approached several other organisations for help in finding possible respondents for this research, as discussed in the introduction. However, the SSR was the most successful go-between.
- 5.
Interview Noor Stevens, June 2011.
- 6.
A quick search on Google [executed March 2016] for ‘Marokkaanse echtscheiding’ (Moroccan divorce) reveals at least a dozen options, and there are probably many more without online presence. Marktplaats is a major Dutch online auction website comparable to eBay, offering their customers the opportunity to buy and sell used and new goods as well as professional services.
- 7.
By e-mail, January 2011.
- 8.
March 2012, Rotterdam.
- 9.
There have been significant cutbacks on Dutch government-sponsored legal aid in 2012, but all of the interviewees in this study were interviewed before these new measures took effect.
- 10.
It must be noted that such services are not covered by Dutch government-sponsored legal aid, and thus must be paid for separately.
- 11.
For a more elaborate discussion of lawyers in the divorce procedure see Chapter 4.
- 12.
http://www.elsharkawi.nl/, accessed on 26 April 2013. From the website it does not become clear whether services similar to those of Dutch-Moroccan lawyers or private offices are offered. Unfortunately, I never managed to interview a representative of this lawyer’s office.
- 13.
The Ministries of Foreign and Internal Affairs of the Netherlands and Morocco may also be involved in the legalisation of documents.
- 14.
Interview head of Consular Affairs, 8 October 2009, Rabat, Morocco.
- 15.
This legal representative is often described as a ‘judge’. This does not, however, mean that court cases are held in the embassy, as in Morocco the concept ‘judge’ has a broader meaning than in the Netherlands. There are four Moroccan consulates in the Netherlands, located in the cities of Den Bosch, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, and Utrecht. The Moroccan embassy is located in The Hague.
- 16.
Interview with embassy representative, 5 December 2010.
- 17.
The Dutch ombudsman in 1998 handled similar complaints about treatment at the Dutch embassy in Cairo in a report. The complaints were judged unfounded. De Nationale Ombudsman, report 1998/588, 29 December 1998.
- 18.
Information obtained by e-mail from the Egyptian embassy in the Netherlands in cooperation with my colleague Friso Kulk, July 2011.
- 19.
He was asked to specify and write down the reasons why he wanted contact with his child. None of the mothers in this research who had been separated from their children reported ever being asked such a question.
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Sportel, I. (2016). Support in Transnational Divorce: Actors, Norms, and Their Influence. In: Divorce in Transnational Families. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-34009-8_8
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