Postupak za lišenje roditeljskog prava

Abstract

Deprivation of parental rights is one of the most far-reachingmeasures of family-legal protection of children, which radically affects the status of parents and their human rights, and in our legal system it is reserved for court jurisdiction. The method of legal protection was amended by the adoption of the Family Law in 2005, which abandoned the legal tradition in this area of civil procedure, by prescribing litigation as a method of legal protection. The procedure in legal matters of deprivation of parental rights is regulated by this law as a sort of “omnibus“ procedure, as it is not reserved exclusively for one legal matter, but the rules of this special litigation procedure apply practically to all legal matters related to the exercise of parental rights– adopting decisions on joint or sole exercise of parental rights, the complete or partial deprivation of parental rights, restoring of parental rights, and makingdecisions on the protection of the rights of children recognized by this law for whom protection was not secured in another procedure. This paper presents the results of the conducted theoretical and empirical research of the newly designed process method for deprivation of parental rights. The basic principles of this procedure and process institutes related to a comprehensive and overall understanding of the quality of the proceedings have been scientifically elaborated. In addition, specific features related to active procedural legitimacy, initiation of proceedings, nature and content of claims and the course of the proceedings have been investigated, with particular focus on the position of the child and the various procedural roles of the guardianship authority. The socio-cultural factors that influence the legal formulation and implementation of regulations that regulate the substantive and procedural dimensions of the deprivation of parental rights have been examined in detail, and in particular the manner in which the courts determine, assess and evaluate the best interests of the child. Also, problems related to the content of the ruling and the types of legal protection that can be realized in the procedure are elaborated, especially in the context of the ruling concerning partial deprivation of parental rights and the discrepancy between the practical reach of the current legal solution and its broad theoretical-legal possibilities. The results of the conducted theoretical and empirical research provided a basis for making conclusions about the extent to which the planned civil procedure, as the method of providing civil protection, is adequate given the nature of the legal matter itself, whether the procedure itself, as designed, meets the modern standards of legal protection and whether, and to what extent, verified in legal practice as a procedural mechanism that ensures the provision of legal, fast and efficient legal protection. Based on the results of the research, relevant proposals were defined for normative improvement of legal solutionsand overcoming practical problems that occur in court practice.