Human rights implications of protecting the matrimonial home

Abstract

While international human rights instruments often emphasize the need to respect the family as a unit as well as the individual's right to privacy, they do not normally include specific safeguards of the matrimonial home. However any provision that purports to promote respect for a person's right to privacy and his home necessarily implies a considerable amount of protection for the place where the family resides - the matrimonial home. There is a need for more specific international protection of the matrimonial home, a need to balance the protection of the matrimonial home with other human rights, such as the right to privacy of an individual spouse. The right to marry and form a family as well as the right to privacy remains one of the very basic of human rights. The matrimonial home is but a facet of the implementation of such a right. There is an obligation on the part of States to take appropriate steps to ensure equality of rights and responsibilities of spouses as to marriage, during marriage and its dissolution. In the case of dissolution, provision shall be made for the necessary protection of any children. Moreover the individual who openly and publicly committed himself to marriage, would have his investment in children, home, assets and future earnings, protected by legal and social provisions. The Matrimonial Home despite all the problems that arise when protecting it, would appear to be an important means of complying with international human rights law.