Law Commons^™

Adjudicating The Intersection Of Marital Immigration, Domestic Violence, And Spousal Murder: China-Taiwan Marriages And Competing Legal Domains, Sara L. Friedman

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

Cross-border marriages and other forms of family reunification dominate officially recognized migratory flows around the world today, and they offer the most widely recognized path to naturalized citizenship in destination countries. At the same time, however, transnational marriages may also rest on shaky foundations precisely because immigrant spouses depend on their citizen partner for legal status. When marriages fail due to domestic violence, they expose the incompatibility of different legal domains organized around domestic violence prevention and immigration regulation. This Article examines the legal conflicts that emerged in response to a recent case in Taiwan involving an immigrant wife from …

State Power, Religion, And Women's Rights: A Comparative Analysis Of Family Law, Mala Htun, S. Laurel Weldon

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

Examining cross-national variation in family law, we find that many countries have reformed to promote sex equality. Yet a significant group retains older laws that discriminate against women. These variations reflect the diverse institutional legacies of these societies, conforming closely-but not entirely-to inherited legal traditions: civil law, common law, and postsocialist countries are the most egalitarian, while countries applying religious law are the least. Yet change is possible, even in unlikely contexts. Political conjunctures that disarm religious, nationalist, and fundamentalist opponents can open windows of opportunity for liberalizing reform.

Human Rights and Legal Systems Across the Global South, Symposium, Indiana …