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Precarity, Property, and Homelessness in Toronto
Full text linkThis article analyzes the relationship that unhoused people have to property, both public and private, in Toronto. It argues that in disputes over the use of certain city spaces by unhoused people their interests are subordinate to those of the state and the property- owning public. To advance this argument, this article uses the example of the conflict between unhoused individuals occupying a hotel leased by Toronto at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and the surrounding residents of an affluent neighbourhood. This article concludes by showing that the presence of unhoused people in city spaces not only reveals their precarity in relation to public property but also works to destabilize the dominant private property regime
Navigating the Paths to Justice: A Study on the Role of Social Supports in Responding to Justiciable Events
Full text linkThis article reports the results of an in-depth qualitative study of advice-seeking behaviours in a large Canadian city. Nine participants were recruited from neighbourhood houses in the Vancouver area to discuss their experiences in responding to one of two kinds of justiciable event: a personal injury or a government benefits problem. The paper offers a detailed discussion of nuances in how individuals experienced, characterized, and took action in response to their justiciable problem. Notably, many of the research participants spoke about the importance of social supports and the contingent nature of those supports, both in understanding what they had experienced and in deciding how to respond. This finding suggests that future research on unmet legal needs and advice-seeking behaviour should more explicitly consider the implications of individuals’ social embeddedness in responding to access to justice problems
Mary Jane Mossman’s Quiet Rebels: A History of Ontario Women Lawyers (Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2024)
Full text linkON AN APRIL EVENING IN 1927, a group of thirty-seven women came together for dinner in Toronto at the King Edward Hotel for the annual meeting of the Women’s Law Association of Ontario (WLAO). That night, they celebrated the 30th anniversary of Clara Brett Martin’s call to the bar and the 60th anniversary of Confederation
Book Review: Reclaiming Anishinaabe Law: Kinamaadiwin Inaakonigewin and the Treaty Right to Education by Leo Baskatawang
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Platform Capital and the City: Governing Uber in Buenos Aires and Manchester
Full text linkRecent literature has drawn attention to the various regulatory battles and flashpoints triggered by the entry of platform Transportation network Companies such as Uber and Lyft into cities around the world. Drawing on original case study analysis of Uber in Buenos Aires and Greater Manchester, we explore the increasingly complex and dynamic nature of local regulatory responses to platforms, and how they evolve over time. We develop a three-fold analytical framework that illustrates the important interactions between the competencies of local regulatory actors, the power of different interest groups, and the legitimacy of institutional rules. Our findings suggest that balancing these three components is crucial to counteract the increasingly embedded nature of platforms within local transportation markets. Looking beyond platforms, limited enforcement capacities within the local state and weak mechanisms of collective voice remain significant obstacles to the articulation of decent minimum standards within local economies
Trauma-Informed Judicial Practice Meets Therapeutic Jurisprudence: Compassionate Written Judgments in Child Protection Cases
Full text linkSociety has become acutely aware that trauma arises from many life events and manifests in a range of physical and psychological symptoms. The legal community is increasingly recognizing that clients living with trauma effects would be much better served with trauma-informed services. While much of the emerging literature in the legal field focuses on lawyers’ work, there is growing recognition that judges can also play a role in responding effectively to trauma.
In child protection cases, trauma frequently exists at different yet related levels – for the child who is the subject of protection proceedings, and for one or more of the caregivers whose parenting has been alleged by state authorities to fall below accepted community standards. These proceedings often have at their core situations where parents’ trauma responses have played a significant role in producing the parental behaviours that risk them being permanently separated from their children. Those parents are the focus of this analysis.
The paper does not attempt to delve into the important conversation of whether and how substantive laws in the child protection regime could be adapted to better support individuals experiencing trauma. Instead, it will focus on how judges characterize and respond to parental trauma within their written judgments. These judgments often require judges to critically evaluate the quality of parental care provided by individuals whose own traumatic responses may have undermined their ability to care for their children. The paper argues that adopting a compassionate perspective that respects the dignity of individuals who have experienced trauma represents an integral element of trauma-informed judging and fosters principles of Therapeutic Jurisprudence
Dignity and the Right to Strike
No full text“Dignity” expresses the idea that a human being should never be treated as a means but always as an end. “Dignity” also encompasses a communitarian and relational approach, such as belonging, collective action and “dignity in action”. When we recognize and seek to remedy indignities, we also confer a certain dignity on ourselves. How can these notions be linked to the right to strike? I shall argue that the right to strike underpins the dignity of workers and that this connection is implicit in Advisory Opinion OC-27/21 of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. In national and international courts, such as the International Court of Justice, the concept of dignity can also provide a foundation for the right to strike
Turning Up the Heat: The Right to Strike and the Climate Crisis
No full textThe negative impacts of climate change on the world of work around the world are serious and certain to worsen. Further, the actions needed to mitigate and adapt to these impacts will be deeply disruptive. In 2015, the tripartite constituents of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) unanimously endorsed the ILO Guidelines for a just transition towards environmentally sustainable economies and societies (reaffirmed in 2023), which includes among its guiding principles the right to freedom of association and, by extension, the right to strike — an intrinsic corollary. This article explores potential bases for a right to strike in the context of the climate crisis