Disappointed "Heirs" as a Socio-Legal Phenomenon
Keywords:
Inheritance conflicts, succession, wills, Conflictos de sucesión, sucesión, herencia, testamentosAbstract
This paper focuses on the socio-legal characteristics of succession battles, drawn from a large-scale empirical study of contemporary inheritance and probate procedures and conflicts in Israel. The study shows that litigating disappointed "heirs", i.e. people who challenge the division of the estate because their inheritance hopes have been shattered, are an exception to the rule of undisputed probate and administration of estates. Moreover, the findings point to the will as a risk factor which allows disappointed "heirs" to approach the court, while legal disputes in intestate cases are even scarcer. Based on the findings, the paper also offers a typology of the relational triangles – between the deceased, the alleged heirs, and the disappointed "heirs" - which characterize most of the cases studied. This typology is correlated to the finding that most succession conflicts are not among nuclear family members, but among parties who are remote relatives or with no family relation. Finally, the study documents two dominant outcomes of succession battles: out-of-court compromises that do not respect the prima facie deceased's last wishes; and the irreversible destruction of relationships between siblings. The paper ends with a discussion of the sociological question concerning the possible increase or decrease of the phenomenon of disappointed "heirs", and of the legal implications of the study's findings.
Este artículo se centra en las características sociojurídicas de las disputas de sucesión, obtenidas a partir de un estudio empírico a gran escala de los procedimientos contemporáneos de herencias y sucesiones y los conflictos en Israel. El estudio demuestra que los “herederos” decepcionados que litigan, es decir, las personas que cuestionan la división de los bienes porque no se han colmado sus expectativas, son una excepción a la regla de las sucesiones y administración de bienes sin disputas. Es más, los resultados apuntan al testamento como factor de riesgo que permite a los “herederos” decepcionados a acudir a la justicia, mientras que las disputas legales en los casos de intestados son más escasas si cabe. Basándose en los resultados obtenidos, el artículo también ofrece una tipología de la relación triangular que se establece entre el fallecido, los supuestos herederos, y los “herederos” decepcionados - que caracterizan la mayoría de los casos estudiados. Esta tipología está correlacionada con el hallazgo de que la mayoría de los conflictos de sucesión no se dan entre los miembros de la familia nuclear, sino entre las partes que son parientes distantes o sin relación familiar. Por último, el estudio documenta dos resultados dominantes en las disputas de sucesión: acuerdos alcanzados fuera del juzgado, que no respetan la presunción de última voluntad del fallecido; y la destrucción irreversible de las relaciones entre hermanos. El artículo finaliza con un debate sobre la cuestión sociológica que atañe al posible aumento o disminución del fenómeno de los “herederos” decepcionados, así como de las implicaciones legales de los resultados del estudio.
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