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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 …
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.
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 …
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 …
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.
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, …
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 …
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 …