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Articles 1 - 29 of 29
Full-Text Articles in Law
Mapping Human Rights-Based Climate Litigation In Canada, Lisa Benjamin, Sara L. Seck
Mapping Human Rights-Based Climate Litigation In Canada, Lisa Benjamin, Sara L. Seck
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
In line with global trends, there has been an increase in human rights-based climate litigation brought in Canadian courts in recent years. Some litigants invoke human rights as found in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to push federal and provincial governments to take seriously the implementation of their climate obligations. Other litigants invoke procedural environmental human rights to engage in free speech and peaceful protest in the face of government action supporting fossil fuel consumption or expansion. At the same time, the Supreme Court of Canada has recognized that Canadian courts could develop civil remedies for corporate violations …
Submission To The Toronto Police Services Board’S Use Of New Artificial Intelligence Technologies Policy- Leaf And The Citizen Lab, Suzie Dunn, Kristen Mj Thomasen, Kate Robertson, Pam Hrick, Cynthia Khoo, Rosel Kim, Ngozi Okidegbe, Christopher Parsons
Submission To The Toronto Police Services Board’S Use Of New Artificial Intelligence Technologies Policy- Leaf And The Citizen Lab, Suzie Dunn, Kristen Mj Thomasen, Kate Robertson, Pam Hrick, Cynthia Khoo, Rosel Kim, Ngozi Okidegbe, Christopher Parsons
Reports & Public Policy Documents
We write as a group of experts in the legal regulation of artificial intelligence (AI), technology-facilitated violence, equality, and the use of AI systems by law enforcement in Canada. We have experience working within academia and legal practice, and are affiliated with LEAF and the Citizen Lab who support this letter.
We reviewed the Toronto Police Services Board Use of New Artificial Intelligence Technologies Policy and provide comments and recommendations focused on the following key observations:
1. Police use of AI technologies must not be seen as inevitable
2. A commitment to protecting equality and human rights must be integrated …
Human Rights And Transnational Organized Crime, Robert Currie, Sarah Douglas
Human Rights And Transnational Organized Crime, Robert Currie, Sarah Douglas
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
This chapter will scrutinize the points at which these two legal regimes intersect with and infuse each other. It will proceed in three sections. The first section will provide a brief overview of the international human rights law system, specifically tailored to ground the following parts. The second section will examine the means by which protection is given to the human rights of individuals who are targeted for criminal investigation and prosecution as a result of their alleged involvement in TOC (referred to for efficiency as “accused persons” or “the accused”). It will first briefly explain the means by which …
Climate Change And The Human Rights Responsibilities Of Business Enterprises, Sara L. Seck
Climate Change And The Human Rights Responsibilities Of Business Enterprises, Sara L. Seck
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
The causes of climate change and solutions to it are inherently tied to non-state actors, including businesses. As multinational business enterprises are at the heart of global emissions, historical and current, it is vital to understand how the attribution of climate change impacts goes beyond the responsibilities of states. The first lawsuits targeting companies have begun. Meanwhile, businesses are increasingly focused on sustainability at different levels of their organizations, including by endorsement of business responsibilities for human rights. What independent responsibilities do business enterprises have when they undertake to respect the human rights of those who are vulnerable to climate …
Evidence Brief: Impact Assessment And Responsible Business Conduct, Sara L. Seck, Penelope Simons, Adebayo Majekolagbe
Evidence Brief: Impact Assessment And Responsible Business Conduct, Sara L. Seck, Penelope Simons, Adebayo Majekolagbe
Responsible Business Conduct and Impact Assessment Law
This Evidence Brief provides a concise overview of the April 2020 report, Sara Seck & Penelope Simons, "Impact Assessment and Responsible Business Guidance Tools in the Extractive Sector: Implications for Human Rights, Gender and Stakeholder Engagement" (Draft Final Report for the SSHRC Knowledge Synthesis Grant: Informing Best Practices in Environmental and Impact Assessments, 13 April 2020).
Human Rights And The Impact Assessment Act: Proponents And Consultants As Duty Bearers, Adebayo Majekolagbe, Sara L. Seck, Penelope Simons
Human Rights And The Impact Assessment Act: Proponents And Consultants As Duty Bearers, Adebayo Majekolagbe, Sara L. Seck, Penelope Simons
Responsible Business Conduct and Impact Assessment Law
This chapter is the pre-publication version of a contribution to a book on the new federal Impact Assessment Act (IAA), and builds upon the research conducted for the SSHRC KSG on responsible business conduct and the IAA. We highlight the role of proponents and their consultants as human rights duty bearers and recommend the integration of human rights approaches into impact assessment processes under the IAA.
Extradition And Trial Delays: Recent Developments (And Lessons?) From Canada, Robert Currie, Laura Ellyson
Extradition And Trial Delays: Recent Developments (And Lessons?) From Canada, Robert Currie, Laura Ellyson
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Extradition – the formal rendition of criminal fugitives between states – is well-known to be a time-consuming process that often has impacts, minor or major, on the ability of states to complete prosecution in a timely manner. Thus, the extradition process can sometimes be at odds with the right to trial within a reasonable time, which is part of the overall package of fair trial rights enshrined in international human rights law. In Canada, this right is implemented by paragraph 11(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In recent years Canadian courts have developed a series of principles …
The Broad Implications Of The First Nation Caring Society Decision: Dealing A Death-Blow To The Current System Of Program Delivery On-Reserve & Clearing The Path To Self-Government, Naiomi Metallic
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
On January 26, 2016, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (the “Tribunal”) released a watershed decision in a complaint spearheaded by the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, its Executive Director, Dr. Cindy Blackstock, and the Assembly of First Nations (the “Caring Society” decision). The complaint alleged that Canada, through its Department of Indigenous and Northern Affairs (“INAC” or the “Department”), discriminates against First Nations children and families in the provision of child welfare services on reserve. In its decision, the Tribunal found that INAC’s design, management and control of child welfare services on reserve, along with its …
Business Responsibilities For Human Rights And Climate Change, Sara Seck
Business Responsibilities For Human Rights And Climate Change, Sara Seck
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
This contribution to the work of the International Law Association’s Study Group on Business and Human Rights considers the relationship between business responsibilities for human rights and climate change. While it is now widely accepted that the adverse effects of climate change undermine the enjoyment of human rights, and that businesses have a responsibility to respect human rights, the relationship between business responsibilities for human rights and climate change is unclear. This paper first considers state duties to protect human rights from climate change harms, including harms arising from business activities, and second, considers how the business responsibility to respect …
Internet Surveillance, Regulation, And Chilling Effects Online: A Comparative Case Study, Jonathon Penney
Internet Surveillance, Regulation, And Chilling Effects Online: A Comparative Case Study, Jonathon Penney
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
With internet regulation and censorship on the rise, states increasingly engaging in online surveillance, and state cyber-policing capabilities rapidly evolving globally, concerns about regulatory “chilling effects” online — the idea that laws, regulations, or state surveillance can deter people from exercising their freedoms or engaging in legal activities on the internet have taken on greater urgency and public importance. But just as notions of “chilling effects” are not new, neither is skepticism about their legal, theoretical, and empirical basis; in fact, the concept remains largely un-interrogated with significant gaps in understanding, particularly with respect to chilling effects online. This work …
Introduction To "Regulating Creation: The Law, Ethics, And Policy Of Assisted Human Reproduction", Trudo Lemmens, Andrew Flavelle Martin
Introduction To "Regulating Creation: The Law, Ethics, And Policy Of Assisted Human Reproduction", Trudo Lemmens, Andrew Flavelle Martin
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
In 2004, Canada's Parliament passed the Assisted Human Reproduction Act. Fully in force by 2007, the act was intended to safeguard and promote the health, safety, dignity, and rights of Canadians. However, a 2010 Supreme Court of Canada decision ruled that key parts of the act were invalid. Regulating Creation is a collection of essays built around various components of the 2010 ruling. Featuring contributions by Canadian and international scholars, it offers a variety of perspectives on the role of law in dealing with the legal, ethical, and policy issues surrounding changing reproductive technologies. The book is divided in three …
The Protection Of Human Rights In The Suppression Of Transnational Crime, Robert Currie
The Protection Of Human Rights In The Suppression Of Transnational Crime, Robert Currie
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
This chapter examines the troubled relationship between the various legal regimes under which states cooperate to suppress crime and the protection of human rights, specifically the procedural human rights of individuals targeted for investigation in transnational cases. It provides an analysis of what rights protections exist in the context of the suppression treaties themselves, and also whether and to what extent international human rights law imposes obligations on states when they engage in inter-state cooperation in criminal matters (eg extradition, mutual legal assistance). It concludes that despite the topic being an active one for some decades, relatively few hard human …
Twu Law: A Reply To Proponents Of Approval, Elaine Craig
Twu Law: A Reply To Proponents Of Approval, Elaine Craig
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Trinity Western University has a Community Covenant that only permits sexual minorities to attend at considerable personal cost to their dignity and sense of self-worth. All student and staff applicants to TWU are required to sign this covenant pledging not to engage in same sex intimacy. On April 11, 2014, the Law Society of British Columbia accredited TWU’s law degree program despite the university’s formal policy of exclusion on the basis of sexual orientation. Later that month, the Law Society of Upper Canada and the Nova Scotia Barristers’ Society refused to approve that same program because of concerns regarding the …
Updated Who Guidance On Safe Abortion: Health And Human Rights, Joanna Erdman, Teresa Depiñeres, Eszter Kismodi
Updated Who Guidance On Safe Abortion: Health And Human Rights, Joanna Erdman, Teresa Depiñeres, Eszter Kismodi
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Since its first publication in 2003, the World Health Organization's “Safe abortion: technical and policy guidance for health systems” has had an influence on abortion policy, law, and practice worldwide. To reflect significant developments in the clinical, service delivery, and human rights aspects of abortion care, the Guidance was updated in 2012. This article reviews select recommendations of the updated Guidance, highlighting 3 key themes that run throughout its chapters: evidence-based practice and assessment, human rights standards, and a pragmatic orientation to safe and accessible abortion care. These themes not only connect the chapters into a coherent whole. They reflect …
The Case For The Federation Of Law Societies Rejecting Trinity Western University's Proposed Law Degree Program, Elaine Craig
The Case For The Federation Of Law Societies Rejecting Trinity Western University's Proposed Law Degree Program, Elaine Craig
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Should Canada have a law school that discriminates against gays and lesbians? Would the governing bodies of the legal profession in Canada approve a law school that prohibited mixed race sexual intimacy? Should a self-regulating legal profession require that the policies of the institutions that produce this country's next generation of lawyers respect equality and academic freedom? Trinity Western University (TWU), a private Christian school in British Columbia is posed to become Canada’s first Christian law school. Trinity Western discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation in both its hiring and admissions policies. It has also been found to violate …
Book Review: Gary Botting, Extradition Between Canada And The United States (Ardsley: Transnational Publishers, 2005), Robert Currie
Book Review: Gary Botting, Extradition Between Canada And The United States (Ardsley: Transnational Publishers, 2005), Robert Currie
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Both domestic and international laws regarding the extradition of fugitive criminal offenders are in a state of flux throughout the world. The current legal landscape reflects tension between the interest of state authorities in promoting “security,” on the one hand, and increasing recognition that human rights obligations are at play, on the other. Gary Botting’s book, Extradition Between Canada and the United States, successfully addresses this tension by way of a detailed examination of what is probably the most integrated extradition partnership outside the European Union.
Harm Reduction, Human Rights, And Access To Information On Safer Abortion, Joanna Erdman
Harm Reduction, Human Rights, And Access To Information On Safer Abortion, Joanna Erdman
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
A harm reduction and human rights approach, grounded in the principles of neutrality, humanism, and pragmatism, supports women's access to information on the safer self-use of misoprostol in diverse legal settings. Neutrality refers to a focus on the risks and harms of abortion rather than its legal or moral status. Humanism refers to the entitlement of all women to care and concern for their lives and health, to be treated with respect, worth, and dignity, and to the empowerment of women to participate in decision-making and political action. Pragmatism accepts the historical reality that women will engage in unsafe abortion, …
Communications Disruption And Censorship Under International Law: History Lessons, Jonathon Penney
Communications Disruption And Censorship Under International Law: History Lessons, Jonathon Penney
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
With Internet censorship on the rise around the world, a variety of tools have proliferated to assist Internet users to circumvent such censorship. However, there are few studies examining the implications of censorship circumvention under international law, and its related politics. This paper aims to help fill some of that void, with an examination of case studies wherein global communications technologies have been disrupted or censored — telegram cable cutting and censorship, high frequency radio jamming, and direct broadcast satellite blocking — and how the world community responded to that disruption or censorship through international law and law making. In …
Charter Without Borders? The Supreme Court Of Canada, Transnational Crime And Constitutional Rights And Freedoms, Robert Currie
Charter Without Borders? The Supreme Court Of Canada, Transnational Crime And Constitutional Rights And Freedoms, Robert Currie
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
The first decades of the Supreme Court of Canada's Charter jurisprudence have coincided roughly with an increase in the extent to which Canada is affected by transnational crime and the nation's consequential participation in inter-state efforts to combat it. The court itself has remarked on its discrete "jurisprudence on matters involving Canada's international co-operation in criminal investigations and prosecutions." This article examines the Court's adoption of a different approach to Charter analysis in cases involving transnational elements and surveys where the Court has "drawn the line" in terms of Charter application. By way of analyzing jurisprudence on exclusion of evidence …
Wrongful Termination Claims In The Supreme Court Of Canada: Coming Up Short, Dianne Pothier
Wrongful Termination Claims In The Supreme Court Of Canada: Coming Up Short, Dianne Pothier
Dianne Pothier Collection
The author concludes that the Supreme Court of Canada's narrow interpretations in Wal-Mart and Honda undermine the purposes of collective bargaining and human rights legislation, respectively Wal-Mart involves an unfair labour practice complaint following the closing of a store in Jonquibre, Quebec. The author contests the analysis of the Supreme Court of Canada, as being far removed from the context of the real difficulties in dealing with determined anti-union employers, instead facilitating statutory evasion. Honda involves a claim for wrongful dismissal, where the issue at the Supreme Court of Canada level is one of remedy, premised on the dismissal amounting …
Access To Information On Safe Abortion: A Harm Reduction And Human Rights Approach, Joanna Erdman
Access To Information On Safe Abortion: A Harm Reduction And Human Rights Approach, Joanna Erdman
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
With convergence-divergence as an organizing theme, this Article explores harm reduction and human rights as conceptual approaches to and discourses about unsafe abortion. The vehicle for this exploration is access to safer-use information on medication abortion, namely women’s self-administration of the drug misoprostol. More specifically, this Article focuses on the Sanitary Initiative Against Unsafe Abortion (“the Uruguay Model”) as an actualized model or prototype of access to information through physician-patient consultation in restrictive legal environments. On convergence, this Article seeks to test the claim that international human rights law imposes government obligations to provide, and to refrain from interfering with …
Canadian Mining Internationally And The Un Guiding Principles For Business And Human Rights, Sara Seck
Canadian Mining Internationally And The Un Guiding Principles For Business And Human Rights, Sara Seck
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Between 2005 and 2011, there was much debate within Canada and at the United Nations over what role home states should play in the regulation and adjudications of human rights harms associated with transnational corporate conduct. In Canada, this debate focused upon concerns associated with global mining, and led to a series of government, opposition and multi-stakeholder reports and proposals. These culminated in 2010 with the appointment of a Corporate Social Responsibility Counsellor for the Extractive Sector and the defeat of Bill C-300, an act respecting Corporate Accountability for the Activities of Mining, Oil or Gas in Developing Countries. Meanwhile, …
Internet Access Rights: A Brief History And Intellectual Origins, Jonathon Penney
Internet Access Rights: A Brief History And Intellectual Origins, Jonathon Penney
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
If there is anything we have learned from recent protest movements around the world, and the heavy-handed government efforts to block, censor, suspend, and manipulate Internet connectivity, it is that access to the Internet, and its content, is anything but certain, especially when governments feel threatened. Despite these hard truths, the notion that people have a "right" to Internet access gained high-profile international recognition last year. In a report to the United Nations General Assembly in early 2011, Frank La Rue, the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression, held that Internet access should be recognized as a "human right". …
Moral Authority In English And American Abortion Law, Joanna Erdman
Moral Authority In English And American Abortion Law, Joanna Erdman
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
In R. (on the application of Axon) v. Secretary of State for Health & Another, the English High Court affirmed that young women are entitled to seek and receive sexual health care, including abortion care, without parental notification. This chapter examines the Court’s use of comparative constitutional authorities in its reasoning, focusing on the rejection of American authorities. Contrast and rejection, it is argued, can be an exercise in self-reflection, revealing how a court understands its own constitutional approach. Aversive constitutionalism presents opportunities to deconstruct claimed similarities and differences in constitutional approaches, to uncover and contest characteristics and assumptions otherwise …
Adding Social Condition To The Canadian Human Rights Act, A. Wayne Mackay, Natasha Kim
Adding Social Condition To The Canadian Human Rights Act, A. Wayne Mackay, Natasha Kim
Reports & Public Policy Documents
Almost a decade ago, in June 2000, the Canadian Human Rights Act Review Panel conducted a comprehensive review of the Canadian Human Rights Act [CHRA] and recommended that “social condition” be added as a prohibited ground of discrimination. Since then, no action has been taken to implement this recommendation, despite calls for action from international bodies, political actors, human rights agencies and organizations, and academic commentators to provide protections from discrimination for those suffering from social and economic disadvantage. The authors analyze the experiences at the provincial level with socio-economic grounds of discrimination, jurisprudential developments under the Canadian Charter of …
Human Rights In Health Equity: Cervical Cancer And Hpv Vaccines, Joanna Erdman
Human Rights In Health Equity: Cervical Cancer And Hpv Vaccines, Joanna Erdman
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
This article seeks to demonstrate that health equity, as an empirical and normative concept, is reflected in the human rights to health and equality under international law. The obligations on government that flow from health equity as a human right are then examined. These include the obligation to act in pursuit of health equity as a policy objective, and the obligation to enact measures to ensure health equity as a policy outcome. These obligations are considered in relation to a promising remedial measure for social disparities in cervical cancer: HPV vaccines.
Social And Economic Rights In Canada: What Are They And Who Can Best Protect Them?, A. Wayne Mackay
Social And Economic Rights In Canada: What Are They And Who Can Best Protect Them?, A. Wayne Mackay
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
This article examines the development and current status of positive social and economic rights in Canada. Exploring the comparative competence of legislatures, courts and human rights tribunals, Wayne MacKay suggests that courts should depart, with caution, from their traditional deferential role to legislators. Due to their flexibility and accessibility, HR Tribunals should supplement the role of the courts and legislatures in giving effect to social and economic rights, which should form part of a holistic package of human rights in Canada.
Home State Obligations For The Prevention And Remediation Of Transnational Harm: Canada, Global Mining And Local Communities, Sara Seck
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Canadian mining companies, stock exchanges, mining professionals, and the Canadian government itself, play a significant role in global mining. This unpublished PhD dissertation, completed in January 2008, explores whether Canada has a legal obligation to regulate to prevent and remedy human rights and environmental harm associated with Canadian mining companies operating abroad. Canada and global mining serve as a case study to explore the broader question of whether home states have obligations under international environmental and human rights law. The key claims examined in this dissertation are as follows. First, the exercise of unilateral home state jurisdiction over transnational corporate …
Transphobia And The Relational Production Of Gender, Elaine Craig
Transphobia And The Relational Production Of Gender, Elaine Craig
Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press
Knowing one's place in the social order, whether that place is one of relative privilege or not, serves two psychologically ameliorative functions. It relieves one from the “anxiety of [gender] identity interrogation” and it helps to inform one as to the socially agreed upon, acceptable conduct for interpersonal exchanges--the episteme of social interaction. This Paper will demonstrate that gender identity is produced through relational, contextually influenced, interpretative processes. Because gender is constructed in societies which strongly embrace static, binary conceptions of gender, and in which social, familial, occupational, and sexual *139 interactions are heavily influenced by gendered social scripts, gender …