INTRODUCTION

The Commission on European Family Law (CEFL) has reached its 19th year of existence. Established in 2001, the CEFL has drafted five sets of Principles of European Family Law in the field of divorce, maintenance between former spouses, parental responsibilities, property relations between spouses and de facto unions. They can be considered as model laws for national legislators in their quest to reform their family law systems. In turn, new family law legislation inspired by the European Family Law Principles contributes to the further harmonisation of family law in Europe. This contribution provides information about the various activities of the CEFL, its organisation, working method, results, finances and impact so far. Finally, the question of the next steps to be taken will be answered.

ORGANISATION, COMPOSITION AND MEETINGS

The CEFL is a foundation under Dutch law. The CEFL consists of two groups: the Organising Committee and the Expert Group. The Organising Committee set up the Expert Group and prepared and coordinated the work of the Commission as a whole. The members of the Organising Committee are at the same time members of the Expert Group. Over the years the composition of the Organising Committee has hardly changed. Frédérique Ferrand (Lyon), Nigel Lowe (Cardiff), Dieter Martiny (Frankfurt (Oder), later Hamburg) and this author (Utrecht, later Hamburg) were the founding members, together with Walter Pintens (Leuven) and Dieter Schwab (Regensburg). The latter left in 2003 and two new members joined the Organising Committee in that same year: Cristina González Beilfuss (Barcelona) and Maarit Jänterä -Jareborg (Uppsala). Only in 2013 was Walter Pintens replaced by Velina Todorova (Sofia).

The Expert Group is comprised of specialists in the field of family and comparative law from most of the European Union Member States, with the involvement of experts from other European countries, such as Norway, Russia and Switzerland. Over the years, the number of experts has increased. For each specific working field, they were invited to contribute by drafting a national report and taking part in Expert Meetings. Some of them have accompanied us over the years, others have been replaced by new experts, and still others have only joined the group for the latest working field.