In Denemarken en Nederland is sprake geweest van wetgeving die tot doel had, in het belang van het kind, de gelijkheid van ouders ten opzichte van hun kinderen verder te bevorderen. Voor beide landen werd al tijdens de parlementaire behandeling van de wetsvoorstellen toegezegd dat de wetten binnen een termijn van drie jaar zouden worden geëvalueerd. Inmiddels heeft de evaluatie van de Deense wet op de ouderlijke verantwoordelijkheid ook tot wetswijziging geleid. In dit artikel worden de achtergrond van de Deense wetsevaluatie, de evaluatie zelf en de daaropvolgende wetswijzigingen behandeld. Daarna wordt kritisch gekeken naar de interactie tussen de wetsevaluatie en de daaropvolgende wetswijzigingen. De vragen die hier rijzen, betreffen de doelstellingen van de wetsevaluatie. Wat werd beoogd? Moest de wet zich bewijzen of werd alleen beoogd de eventuele scherpe randjes van de wet af te halen? In hoeverre zijn de bevindingen verwerkt in de daaropvolgende wetswijzigingen? Ten slotte wordt het gezamenlijk ouderschap na evaluatie in perspectief gebracht.
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Recent developments in Danish and Dutch legislation have provided norms which were directed at furthering equality between parents, in the interest of the child. In both countries, it was promised in the course of the parliamentary deliberations that the enacted legislation would be evaluated within a period of three years. The Danish evaluation led to new legislation being enacted. In this article the background for the Danish evaluation, the findings in the evaluation en the resulting legislative changes are deliberated. Subsequently, the interaction between the evaluation and the resulting changes is critically analysed. An essential question concerns the purpose of the evaluation. What was envisaged? That the stated aims were realised? Or just the elimination of sharp edges of the legislation? To what extent were the findings in the evaluation taken into account in the subsequent legislative changes? Finally, joint parenting after evaluation will be brought into perspective.

Legal position of a known donor constitutes an ongoing challenge. Known donors are often willing to play a role in the child’s life. Their wishes range from scarce involvement to aspiring legal parentage. Therefore three persons may wish for parental role. This is not catered for in the current laws allowing only for two legal parents. Several studies show how lesbian mothers and a donor ’devise new definitions of parenthood’ extending ’beyond the existing normative framework’. However, the diversity in the roles of the donors suggests a split of parental rights between three persons rather than three traditional legal parents. In this article I will discuss three jurisdictions (Quebec, Sweden and the Netherlands), allowing co-mother to become legal parent other than by a step-parent adoption. I will examine whether these jurisdictions attempt to accommodate specific needs of lesbian families by splitting up parentage ’package’ between the duo-mothers and the donor.

This article discusses the possibility spouses have under the Rome III Regulation (EC Regulation 1259/2010) to choose the law applicable to their divorce. It discusses the limits and exceptions of this freedom to choose.