Las uniones convivenciales en la nueva legislación civil argentina

Abstract

Domestic unions and the acknowledgment of “other” rights outside of Title III of the Civil Code of Argentina are some of the novelties introduced in “Family,” the Second Book of the 2012 Civil Code Reform and Unification Project. Title III regulates the “domestic union,” formerly known as “concubinary union” or “concubinage”.The purpose of this paper is to investigate the background of said regulation in order to understand its legal framework. It also seeks to identify the problem between the principle of autonomy and the idea of public order, or the duality between the right not to marry and the right to a comprehensive protection of the family: Is domestic union the ideal mechanism to solve the social tension between marriage and de facto unions while respecting constitutional principles and values? The possibility that cohabitating couples will benefit from housing protection and be entitled to compensation for damages resulting from the death of their partner, among other things, are reasons to believe there is more than one type of family, based not only on genetics but also on affectional bonds. This is not a creation of the leaders of the project, but an acknowledgment of the jurisprudence and doctrines that, particularly following the constitutional reform of 1994, proposed extending the rights to this type of family and affective structure, different from marriage.