So, it seems that the French are going to make a stab at reducing their very high divorce rate. The French Government has announced plans to introduce marriage preparation kits and longer civil ceremonies which currently can be as short as five minutes.

But François de Singly, a sociology professor at Paris Descartes University, has other ideas. He appears to thinks marriage only exists where there is love and that the State has no right intruding in people’s private lives.

More precisely he said: “It’s not the marriage that produces the divorce. It’s ultimately the absence of love or the waning of love. Why is the state getting involved in this? It would be a total intrusion into private life. If the government imposes preparation or a sort of entrance exam for civil marriage, it will not reinforce marriage. I fear it could destabilise it further.”

The professor is confused. If marriage is purely a private thing then why is the State involved in it at all? Why does it recognise marriage? Why does it give it certain legal rights and duties? 

Obviously the French State believes that society has an interest in helping marriages succeed and therefore the success or failure of a marriage is not a purely private affair. A high divorce rate is not in the interest of society.

It is also interesting that the professor appears to believe that a marriage only exists where there is love. Actually, a marriage exists so long as the legal contract of marriage exists and ends once the contract ends. The legal contract can exist with or without love.

Indeed, some heroic parents stay together even when they don’t love each other for the sake of their kids. They should be praised for putting their own happiness second.

The professor seems to think marriage is a purely private relationship that is based on transitory feelings. It is much more than that. It is also a social and legal institution which is why society and the State have an interest in strengthening marriage.