Same-Sex Spouses: More Free Movement, but What About Marriage? Coman: Case C-673/16, Coman et al. v. Inspectoratul General Pentru Imigrări, Judgement of the Court of Justice (Grand Chamber) of 5 June 2018, EU:C:2018:385
Common Market Law Review 57(1), pp. 227–242, 2020
University of Groningen Faculty of Law Research Paper No. 21/2020
12 Pages Posted: 6 May 2020 Last revised: 30 Apr 2021
Date Written: April 10, 2020
Abstract
This paper provides a critical annotation of the case of Coman, where the Court of Justice clarified that the meaning of the term ‘spouse’ in Directive 2004/38 was gender-neutral, opening up the door for same-sex marriage recognition for immigration purposes all around the EU, thus destroying the hetero-normative misinterpretations of the clear language of the Directive practiced in a handful of Member States. The state of EU law after Coman is still far from perfect, however: we underline a line of important questions which remain open and which the Court will need to turn to in the near future to ensure that marriage equality in moves beyond mere proclamations in the whole territory of the Union. A more detailed analysis of the Case is provided by the authors in the pages of the Maastricht Journal of European and Comparative Law (2020) and has also appeared, in draft, as an EUI Working Paper.
Keywords: Same-Sex Marriage, Coman, EU Citizenship, Free Movement, Equality, Non-Discrimination
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