The open future: Analysing the temporality of autonomy in family law

This article takes a novel approach by applying a theoretical framework of temporality to the law governing financial obligations on divorce. Although under-explored, particularly in family law, time and temporality are powerful tools of legal governance that reinforce norms and expectations of behaviour. The article explores family law’s increasing preoccupation with principles of individual autonomy, as demonstrated through the recognition of prenuptial agreements and the expectation of financial self-sufficiency post-divorce. It argues that law’s expectations of autonomy are reflected through temporal mechanisms, promoting liberal ideals of linear progress and modernity. The prenup and the clean break are based on an imagined legal subject who can seamlessly move on from the divorce towards an ‘open future’ that is unconstrained by obligations from the marriage. However, as the article argues, family law’s imagined linear temporality conflicts with the temporal experiences of caregivers. Although the certainty promised by the prenup and the clean break is lauded as a universal good, caregivers face considerable temporal barriers to self-righting post-divorce. Problematically, neoliberal rhetoric paints longer-term financial hardship as a personal failure rather than a societal problem, frequently depicting the caregiver as someone stuck in the past and preventing the former spouse from moving forwards