Law Commons^™

‘We Are The Monitors Now’: Experiential Knowledge, Transcorporeality And Environmental Justice, Dayna Scott

Articles & Book Chapters

Residents of pollution hotspots often take on projects in ‘citizen science’, or popularepidemiology, in an effort to marshal the data that can prove their experience of the pollution to the relevant authorities. Sometimes these tactics, such as pollution logs or bucket brigades, take advantage of residents’ spatially ordered and finely honed experiential and sensory knowledge of the places they inhabit. But putting that knowledge into conversation with law requires them to mobilize a new, ‘foreign’ set of tools, primarily oriented to the observation, measurement and sampling of pollution according to conventional scientific standards. Here, I employ qualitative empirical methods in …

Indigenous Women, Water Justice And Zaagidowin (Love), Deborah Mcgregor

Articles & Book Chapters

I would like to open by saying Chi-miigwech (a big thank-you) to those Elders/Grandmothers who have shared their stories and teachings with me over the years. Some have since passed on and I hope that through my words, their love and generosity will continue the process of healing the people and waters upon which they so integrally depend.

The paper which follows contains many references to notions of love, mutual respect, and responsibility towards the natural world, and water in particular. These ideas may seem a little tenuous for a serious paper on a critical environmental justice issue, but concepts …

Indigenous Lawyers In Canada: Identity, Professionalization, Law, Sonia Lawrence, Signa A. Daum Shanks

Articles & Book Chapters

For Indigenous communities and individuals in Canada, "Canadian" law has been a mechanism of assimilation, colonial governance and dispossession, a basis for the assertion of rights, and a method of resistance. How do Indigenous lawyers in Canada make sense of these contradictory threads and their roles and responsibilities? This paper urges attention to the lives and experiences of Indigenous lawyers, noting that the number of self-identified Indigenous lawyers has been rapidly growing since the 1990s. At the same time, Indigenous scholars are focusing on the work of revitalizing Indigenous law and legal orders. Under these conditions, Indigenous lawyers occupy a …

Sex, Gender And The Chemicals Management Plan, Dayna Nadine Scott, Sarah Lewis

Articles & Book Chapters

Chemical substances are found everywhere in our environment. As Chapter 1 makes clear, whether it be at home, outdoors, or in the workplace, we are continuously coming into contact with various chemicals through our air, water, food, cosmetics, clothes, personal care products, and everyday household items (Cooper, Vanderlinden, and Ursitti 2011; Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment 2008). As our detection methods improve, we are increasingly forced to confront the evidence of these exposures: biomonitoring studies now show that nearly everyone has measurable amounts of almost all known toxic chemicals stored somewhere in their bodies (CDC 2013; Environmental Defence …

Addressing Access To Justice Through New Legal Service Providers: Opportunities And Challenges, Alice Woolley, Trevor C. W. Farrow

Articles & Book Chapters

Most informed observers of the Canadian and American legal systems accept the existence of a significant crisis in access to justice. One possible solution is to permit paralegals, notaries or other licensed individuals with training more limited than that enjoyed by a licensed attorney to practice in certain areas of law. This paper supports these developments, arguing for a regulated and incremental introduction of new legal service providers into the legal services market. It considers the appropriate training and scope of practice for new legal service providers, and some of the associated opportunities and challenges.

The Production Of Pollution And Consumption Of Chemicals In Canada, Dayna Nadine Scott, Lauren Rakowski, Laila Zahra Harris, Troy Dixon

Articles & Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

Introduction: War Measures And The Repression Of Radicalism, 1914-1939, Barry Wright, Eric Tucker, Susan Binnie

Articles & Book Chapters

This fourth volume in the Canadian State Trials series, Security, Dissent, and the Limits of Toleration in War and Peace, 1914–1939, brings readers to the period of the First World War and the inter-war years. it follows an approach similar to that of others in the series. the central concern remains the legal responses of Canadian governments to real and perceived threats to the security of the state. the aim is to provide a representative and relatively comprehensive examination of Canadian experiences with these matters, placed in broader historical and comparative context.

Canada Tracks Disability Rights: A Drpi Model Of Systemic Monitoring, Roxanne Mykitiuk, Yvonne Peters

Articles & Book Chapters

This chapter surveys laws and policies in Canada that affect the rights of persons with disabilities. It does so as part of a broader project on international disability rights monitoring and is guided by DRPI's National Law and Policy Monitoring Template (2008). The template is based on the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and other international instruments. The template's purpose is "to monitor human rights for people with disabilities at the systemic level, that is, at the level of existing laws, policies, and programs," and to "identify and draw attention to the most critical gaps and …

Book Review: The Emerging Personality Of The American Corporation, Cynthia A. Williams

Articles & Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

A Traditionalist's Take On Bankruptcy Intersections, Stephanie Ben-Ishai

Articles & Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

The Obsolete Theory Of Crown Unity In Canada And Its Relevance To Indigenous Claims, Kent Mcneil

Articles & Book Chapters

This article examines the application of the theory of the unity of the Crown in Canada in the context of Indigenous peoples. It reveals a consistent retreat by the courts from acceptance of the theory in the late nineteenth century to rejection of it in the second half of the twentieth century. This evolution of the theory' relevance, it is argued, is consistent with Canada federal structure and eventual independence from the United Kingdom. However, in a startling reversal, the Supreme Court reverted to the theory in its 2014 judgment in Grassy Narrows First Nation v Ontario (Minister of Natural …

Succession And Transfer Of Businesses In Canada, Eric Tucker, Christopher Grisdale

Articles & Book Chapters

Canada is a liberal market economy and as such the freedom of owners of capital to transfer businesses is not heavily regulated and the rights of workers affected by those transfers are limited. Before discussing those rights some preliminary matters need to be addressed.

Exclusive Occupation And Joint Aboriginal Title, Kent Mcneil

Articles & Book Chapters

In Tsilhqot’in Nation v British Columbia, the Supreme Court of Canada for the first time issued a declaration of Aboriginal title. The area to which the declaration applies is part of the traditional territory of the Tsilhqot’in Nation, amounting to the land within the claim area that they were able to prove, to the satisfaction of Justice Vickers at trial, had been in their exclusive occupation at the time of Crown assertion of sovereignty in 1846.

The area claimed in the Tsilhqot’in Nation case was not subject to competing claims by other Aboriginal peoples. However, as is well known, …

Fiduciary Obligations And Aboriginal Peoples, Kent Mcneil

Articles & Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

Women Talking About Water: Feminist Subjectivities And Intersectional Understandings, Leila M. Harris, Jyoti Phartiyal, Dayna Nadine Scott, Megan Peloso

Articles & Book Chapters

In this study based on discussions held by women's groups across Canada on water challenges and interests, we recognized that in the current context in Canada, women are truly connected with peoples, humans or any other form of life. They recognize that water is socially embedded, integrating issues of social, ecological and intergenerational justice in relation to complex changes in riparian landscapes. Clearly their talk is from a gender perspective, but we also found movement beyond gender that nuanced cross-sectoral understanding, critical links between gender, class and ethnicity are frequently mentioned.

Reaffirmation Of Debt In Consumer Bankruptcy In Canada, Stephanie Ben-Ishai

Articles & Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

Payment Law: Legislative Competence In Canada, Benjamin Geva

Articles & Book Chapters

This article addresses the legislative competence in Canada in relation to regulatory and transactional aspects of payment of law. Setting out the parameters of "payment law", the article examines the federal legislative powers in relation to bills and notes as well as banking, in broader constitutional and historical context, and argues for federal jurisdiction. A possible legislative role for the provinces is also discussed.

Grounding Access To Justice Theory And Practice In The Experiences Of Women Abused By Their Intimate Partners, Janet Mosher

Articles & Book Chapters

For women seeking to extricate themselves from the web of entrapment woven together by the multiple threads that make up the coercive control repertoire of their abusive intimate partners, it is often difficult to avoid engagement with legal systems. Yet, the legal systems they encounter—criminal, family, child welfare, immigration among them—are frequently unwelcoming (if not hostile), controlling, demeaning, fragmented and contradictory. While there has been a recent explosion of interest in “access to justice,” little attention has been paid to how we might conceptualize access to justice in a manner that speaks meaningfully to the circumstances of women who experience …

Constitutionalising The Senate: A Modest Democratic Proposal, Allan C. Hutchinson, Joel I. Colón-Ríos

Articles & Book Chapters

The Senate Reference did not provide an ideal situation for clarifying the nature and limits of the power of constitutional reform in Canada. The facts gave the Court no choice but to recognize the fundamental role that the Senate plays in the Canadian constitutional order, and therefore to place some of its main features outside the scope of section 44 of the Constitution Act, 1982, even if they ran contrary to basic democratic values. For example, in order to explain that the implementation of consultative elections would alter the constitution’s basic structure, the Court was forced to construe in a …

Comparative Matters: The Renaissance Of Comparative Constitutional Law, Benjamin Berger

Articles & Book Chapters

As the epigraph to one chapter in his impressive volume, Comparative Matters: The Renaissance of Comparative Constitutional Law, Ran Hirschl offers the following exchange between the archaeologist Howard Carter and his patron, Lord Carnarvon, on Carter's entry into Tutankhamun's tomb: “Can you see anything?” “Yes, wonderful things!” The epigraph might aptly frame the volume as a whole. Hirschl's ambition is to seize a pivotal moment in the development of comparative constitutional scholarship and to help those engaged in the field to see more and better. There is a tone of excitement and affection in the pages, born of the …

Notions Of Reproductive Harm In Canadian Law: Addressing Exposures To Household Chemicals As Reproductive Torts, Roxanne Mykitiuk, Alana Cattapan, Mark Pioro

Articles & Book Chapters

Mounting scientific evidence is suggesting that various synthetic chemicals are ubiquitous in the household and natural environment, and are affecting reproductive health in humans. Yet litigation in response to exposure to harmful chemicals has had limited success. This is in large part because causation is often difficult to prove, as exposure often occurs over long periods of time, and the sources of suspected chemical agents are ubiquitous and/or diffuse. In light of these challenges, there is a need to consider new legal strategies to confront these harms.

This article examines the potential for prenatal exposure to harmful chemicals to be …

Foreword For The Inaugural Issue Of The Canadian Journal Of Comparative And Contemporary Law (Cjccl), Lorne Sossin

Articles & Book Chapters

It is my privilege to offer this brief foreword for the inaugural issue of the Canadian Journal of Comparative and Contemporary Law (CJCCL), launched in 2013 by Thompson Rivers University Faculty of Law. 1 will offer a word or two about the Journal and then a word or two about its first issue, which grapples with the complex interrelationship between health law and human rights.

Some might see this as a perilous moment at which to launch a new law journal. We are by any measure at the crossroads of significant change in the dissemination of ideas about law and …

Land Use Priorities And The Law Of Nuisance, Dan Priel

Articles & Book Chapters

Rights-based approaches to tort law have been prominent in recent years in theoretical discussions of tort law. Much of this work has been either highly abstract or focused on a small number of torts like negligence or trespass. Allan Beever’s The Law of Private Nuisance attempts to extend this approach to the tort of private nuisance. Central to his account is the view that the law of nuisance is concerned with prioritising land uses, and that what the law calls ‘nuisance’ is really a case of one land use conflicting with another, higher-ranked one. This essay argues that despite claims …