L’obbligo di fedeltà dopo la stagione delle riforme

The issue regarding fidelity obligation can be viewed from more than one standpoint, reopening a path to the central questions concerning family law. A tangible sign of progress so far is the principle of equality between husband and wife, fidelity obligation is also an important landmark in the rapid evolution that as been reached with the introduction of civil responsibility even within the family circle. The lack of provision in the recent law on civil unions is today the focus of a lively doctrinal debate. This omission, seen in different lights by scholars, seems to reflect a legal idea of the of ​​civil union as the chosen "place" for homosexual couples, by nature alien both to the idea of procreation and to that of a "community" dimension that connotes a traditional family. This latter aspect seems to find confirmation in the lack of provision for collaboration and in the minimal procedures required to dissolve the relationship as well as in the preclusion of binding relations with family members of the other party. Another interesting aspect concerns the relationship between the fidelity obligation and private autonomy, with particular reference, on the one hand, to the decline in such a duty between husband and wife and, on the other, the possibility that the parts of a civil union create fidelity obligation to each other through pacts.