1 Mrs Doubtfire … … or the strategies of a single parent

2  Anxious, she came to our association, in order to have some father’s advices…She felt locked up in its statute of mother with a lot of culpability É lodie is a social worker. Her couple split up just before the birth of Salomé. The father refused to recognize the child and to see her. É lodie took a parental leave …  With a lot of support and negotiations, she managed, little by little, to create a good bond between the father and the daughter  Today, their situation has progressed very well : they deposit a request to organise an alternated residence for Salomé, 2 years old today

3  Élodie recognizes to have more time for herself, she feels secure to share the educational responsibility and Salomé is glad …  In these ‘a little desperate’ contacts, at the beginning, with our association, Élodie discovered the sufferings of paternal exclusion but reacted to certain insinuations misogynists …  Now, she’s a member of our board of director, and she offered pictures of Salomé for the communication of our association [dads = moms]

4 Divorce and separation : an institutional resistance in responsibilities share  30% in rural area, 40% in urban area, 50% in Parisian area …  Mode of child residence attributed by justice: 10% of alternated residence, 10% of rights of visits and residence for fathers, 80% for mothers *  Right of visits : 1 week/2 + half of school holidays  An institutional impossibility, after separation, to share the tasks spots bounded to the child and to have personal time, to the detriment of women  Gap between co parental practices and institutional frame (resistance to alternated residence) * Ministry of Justice, 2003

5 Divorce and separation : space of gender conflict  Double stress rate for separated person than married or single ones (SOFRES, 2006)  60% of separation without conflicts, 40% of long conflicts *  18 % of “amicable” alternated residence and 2% in disagree *  Main cause of conflicts : child residence  Light conflict’s regulation (1.6% of familial mediation) * Ministry of Justice, 2003

6 Divorce and separation : institutional and individual reproducing of traditional schemes  Mothers want separation in 80% of the cases  Main residence with mothers is attributed by court at 80%  Fathers want main residence in 30% of the cases, attributed by court in 10% of the cases Children with mother … Financial contribution for father …

7 Divorce and separation : an institutional resistance in responsibilities share  While the current legislation tends to facilitate the procedures of divorce or to facilitate unions, out of marriage …  the same legislation does not take into account the fathers who abandon their educational role, nor protect father's bound. (95% of impunity in case of no respect of visit right*) 30% of children don’t see any more their father 2 years after divorce * Indeed, the legal steps can be launched only with regard to the pension or allowances State business for the conjugal violence and allowances, private business for the sharing and the management of the conflicts … * Ministry of Justice, 1996 & 2003

8 First perspectives  To enhance the value of father’s role  Example : “Fathers in movement” in partnership with the program “fathers involvement initiative”, Ministry of Health, Canada  A better regulation in divorces and separations * :  Lower conflicts (with an earlier familial mediation)  Real coparentality (children time sharing)  Optimization of the father's contacts in precarious situations * Pilot study by G. Neyrand (socio) & P. Rossi (psy)