The loss of the breadwinner in private and social law. Towards a legal framework for the allocation of responsibilities to the individual, the breadwinner and the society.

The aim of this fundamental research is to develop a legal framework for an allocation of social
responsibilities between the individual, his (possible) breadwinner and the society (in the form of the social
security system), to guarantee everybody's right to social/economic security. At a first stage we examine to
what extent and on which bases private law obliges or allows partners to act as breadwinner for each other
and to what extent and on which bases these obligations continue or will be taken over by the social security
system, in case the breadwinner is affected by a social risk (incapacity for work, unemployment or
elderness). At a second stage we analyze the (interaction between) the private and social protection of the
partner against the loss of his breadwinner, caused by his death or by the end of the relationship. At a third
stage the determined breadwinner obligations and civil and social substitution mechanisms will be reviewed
in function of the human rights concerning the protection of the family life, the right to marry (or not) and to
found a family and the principles of equality and non-discrimination. In the last part solutions for the gaps in
the guarantees of the social security of the individual will be hand out. The research includes a (functional)
comparison of the individualization of (the former breadwinner related) social security rights in the
Netherlands and of the (progressive) jurisdiction of the Canadian Supreme Court concerning the unequal
treatment of married people and unmarried people in the field of matrimonial property law.