Commentary on the Resolution of the Full Bench of the Civil Chamber of the Polish Supreme Court of 4 March 2025 (III CZP 6/24): Approbative Gloss

Abstract

This article discusses the resolution of the Polish Supreme Court of 4 March 2025, III CZP 6/24, which constitutes a breakthrough in Polish jurisprudence concerning the procedural framework in cases relating to the legal determination of the gender of transgender persons. The resolution departs from the previously established rule that the occurrence of transgender does not provide grounds for rectifying the entry specifying gender in a birth certificate (resolution of the Supreme Court of 22 June 1989), opening the possibility of changing the gender designation in a birth certificate at the request of the person concerned, with effect ex nunc – that is, from the date on which the judgment becomes final and binding, not retroactively. The legal basis for this approach is Article 36 of the Law on Civil Status Records, applied per analogiam. In this manner, the previously developed judicial model based on adversarial proceedings (Article 189 of the Code of Civil Procedure) has been replaced by a non-contentious judicial model, in which the interested person files an application, without the necessity of bringing an action against his or her own parents.