If a bill proposed by legislator Patricia Mora takes hold, parents will be able to choose the order of their children’s surnames.
The initiative, called the Law on Equality in the Enrollment of Surnames, would allow Costa Rican couples to decide the last name their children will take first.
If there is no agreement between the parents, the surnames would be prioritized to prevent the parents from going to court to resolve disputes.
To avoid confusion in the family group, the order of surnames assigned to the eldest child would be the same for the rest of their siblings.
All human rights instruments establish that men and women are equal before the law, so there is no reason for the paternal surname to always be the first,”
said Mora.
The legislator said that the proposal seeks to improve Costa Rica’s commitments on human rights and eradicate stereotyped gender roles, which give women a subordinate role to men.