Ethical and Legal Dimensions of Abusing the Emergency Circumstances of People in Marriage In Iran

Article 206 of the Civil Code considers a forced transaction with defective consent valid. However, Article 190 of the Civil Code states that consent is a condition for the validity of a marriage. In addition, the emergency circumstance in jurisprudence led to a series of rulings and duties.

This study is descriptive-analytical and uses the library technique.

When one of the parties to the marriage, who is aware of the emergency circumstance of the other party, abuses this circumstance with the motive of profit-seeking and brings the other party into the marriage due to an emergency, the marriage is unfair and legally invalid. Iranian law has several opinions on abusing the emergency circumstance of people and imposing an unfair contract on them, including the theory of validity, non-intrusion, termination, and validity with the condition of adjustment or annulment, out of which the theory of non-interference has been chosen because it is fairer and more compatible with justice and preserves the distressed person's rights. In Iranian law, comparing the general rules of contracts with the marriage contract indicates that exclusiveness does not guarantee invalidity and termination of the marriage contract. On the other hand, the validity theory supports distressed people's rights. Therefore, the latter theory, i.e., non-intrusion, that guarantees fair execution when abusing distressed people and is accepted in the general rules of contracts, can be extended to the marriage contract as well.