The Function and Criteria of Intergenerational Inheritance Law.

According to intestate inheritance law, one's descendants inherit the property of his estate. The sole criterion for intergenerational inheritance rights is legal parentage. However, parentage neglects different family situations. Despite the societal evolution to families of choice (e.g. blended families, homo-sexual couple with children), children who are only biologically or socially related to the deceased, do not inherit because of the requirement of legal parentage. Furthermore, because legal parentage is sufficient to inherit, financial need of heirs and the quality of the relationship with the deceased are not taken into account for the entitlement to intestate inheritance rights. Yet, the European Court of Human Rights and the Belgian Constitutional Court take into account a broader variation of family situations. This tendency should also be noted in foreign legal systems, such as The Netherlands where it is possible for stepchildren to inherit equally to legal children. Also in other Belgian domains of law legal parentage is not an exclusive criterion. For example, in maintenance law children who are only biologically related to their parent can claim maintenance. These evolutions question the function and criteria of intergenerational intestate inheritance law. Thus, this research will verify whether legal parentage is necessary to inherit, and whether it is sufficient. To answer this question the function of intergenerational inheritance law will be determined.

Keywords:INHERITANCE LAW

Disciplines:Law