74% want shorter waiting period
3 years, current waiting period
9.4% + increase in divorces, since 1995
The life cycle of the Italian family is changing — longer engagements, bigger weddings, fewer children and shorter marriages. Divorce is still relatively new in this Catholic country — allowed by a 1974 referendum — and lengthy legal separations (a three-year minimum) mean ending a marriage isn’t taken lightly.
Though Italy has the lowest divorce rate in Europe, this may soon change if lawmakers approve a current proposal to reduce the waiting time to a year — when the formal separation period was reduced from five years to three, rates increased more than 9%.
While divorce, Italian style stereotypically conjures up images of crashing plates, raging jealousy and lifelong vendettas — 86,4% of Italian divorces are no-fault and around 30% of couples who legally separate never get a formal divorce.
Nevertheless, the number of divorces and type change radically from North to South — about three times more couples decide to call it quits in the upper half of Italy, but those that decide to split in the Mezzogiorno are more likely to contest the divorce. The average marriage lasts 13 years and there are few "repeat offenders" — of those who remarry, only 1.1% get divorced or separated again. ?1999-2004 zoomata.com
Zoomata is the brainchild of a bilingualjournalist based in Italy who thinks out of the box. This brain is for hire.
Related resources:
Divorce Italian Style
The good old days? Marcello Mastroianni plotting his wife’s adultery and his subsequent crime of "passion" to justify the split…