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Legal Studies, Vol. 36 No. 1, 2016, pp. 1-19
DOI: 10.1111/lest.12118
Winner of the SLS Annual Conference
Best Paper Prize 2015
Towards an understanding of the basis of
obligation and commitment in family law
Gillian Douglas*
Cardiff University
Much family law scholarship in recent years has been focused on the recognition of different
types of family relationship. Often, the rationale for the grant of rights and duties to new
forms of relationship is said to be because the parties have shown commitment, or the same
degree of commitment, as those informally recognised unions, such as marriage. But there
has been relatively little consideration of why or how commitment can provide an adequate
rationale for the imposition of legal consequences, in particular, legal obligations, espe-
cially when such commitment may be lacking on the part of one of the parties, or comes
to an end. This paper explores the meanings of obligation and commitment within the family
and questions whether commitment provides a necessary or sufficient justification for the
imposition of legal obligations in family relationships.
Gillian Douglas, Professor of Law, Cardiff School of Law and Politics, Cardiff University, Law Building,
Museum Avenue, Cardiff CF10 3AX, UK. Email: DouglasG@cf ac.uk
INTRODUCTION
[N]ature is the first lawgiver, and when she has set tempers opposite, not all the
golden links of wedlock nor iron manacles of law can keep 'em fast.'
Much family law scholarship in recent years has been focused on the recognition of
different types of family relationship. In this paper, focusing on the duty to maintain a
spouse or a child, I switch attention to the nature of and rationale for the obligations
resulting from such recognition. I compare the concept of obligation with the growing
emphasis on commitment as the basis for family ties and suggest that such emphasis is
incompatible with enforcing obligations at the point at which they become important -
when 'commitment' has been lost (eg on divorce) or has never been given (such as
* I am very grateful to the Leverhulme Trust for funding the Major Research Fellowship that
enabled the research for this paper to be undertaken. I would also like to thank colleagues who
attended the Family Law Section at the SLS 2015 Annual Conference in York for their helpful
comments on this paper.
1. G Farquhar The Beaux' Stratagem (1707) Act m, Sc 3.
@ 2016 The Society of Legal Scholars](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/legstd36&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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