Affective Ties and Legal Boundaries: Families and the Family Between Law and Tradition in Italy and Romania

The fundamental pillar of any society is the family. The family provides its members with security, stability and excitement. The family is the environment in which we form our personality, acquire values and skills. In the family we learn about love, responsibility, communication and respect, how to develop our emotional and social skills and how to form a balanced identity. Most individuals believe that family is the value that gives meaning to life. From a legal point of view, the family is that group of people between whom there are rights and obligations that arise from marriage, kinship but also from other relationships that the law assimilates to family relationships. Thus, as Prof. Dr. Ion Filipescu said, the family is a legal reality because it is regulated by legal norms. Considering the fact that legal rules are closely related to the history, culture, economy and social evolution specific to each state, the legal rules governing the family vary from one state to another.