Fall Event Videos: Margot Young, Eric Adams, Our-More-Than-Human Constitutions

Interview Series: Marion Sandilands on the Notwithstanding Clause

Forum 34.2: Open Issue

We're delighted to announce the publication of a new open issue of the Constitutional Forum, guest edited by Areeba Ismail, Maria Kalapurayil, and Nicole Ibalio (2025 CCS Summer Students and JD Candidates at the University of Alberta). You can access the full issue for free via the links below:

 

CONSTITUTIONAL FORUM: 34.2 (Open Issue)

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Contents

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Editorial Introduction
Areeba Ismail, Maria Kalapurayil, Nicole Ibalio

Emergence of Contemporary Indigenous Restorative Justice in Canada
The Honourable Leonard S Tony Mandamin

What is Sovereignty?
Ian Peach

The Constitutional Status of Overbreadth: A Reply to Professor Stewart
Colton Fehr

Is the Notwithstanding Clause an Ouster Clause?
Adebayo Majekolagbe

The Charter’s Forgotten Weapon: Reclaiming Section 28 For Trans Equality
Erin Masters

Surveillance Capitalism and the Charter: Infusing the Common Law with Charter Values
Miles Schaffrick

Notwithstanding the Backbench: Section 33 in Non-Government Bills
Charlie Feldman

Andrew Stobo Sniderman Lecture Video: Public Services on Reserves

Review 29.2 & 29.3: Our More Than Human Constitutions

The Centre is delighted to host a special double issue of the Review of Constitutional Studies, which can now be downloaded for free via the links below. The special issue is entitled "Our More Than Human Constitutions," and was guest edited by Professors Lindsay Borrows (Queen's University) and Jessica Eisen (University of Alberta). It comprises contributions from scholars in an array of academic fields -- including constitutional law, Indigenous law, environmental law, animal law, and ethnobotany -- on the ways in which our legal orders, Indigenous and state, approach the regulation of the more-than-human.

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Issue 1: 29.2

Introduction: Our More-than-Human Constitutions
Borrows, Lindsay; Eisen, Jessica

Learning Anishinaabe Law from the Earth
Borrows, John

Transforming Constitutionalism from a More-than-Human Perspective
Nedelsky, Jennifer

Nehiyaw Pimatisiwin and Regenerative Constitutionalism
Lindberg, Darcy

Dark Innovations, Climate Justice, and the Canadian Charter
Majekolagbe, Adebayo

"A Hot Day in Iqaluit"? Environmental Rights in Canada's Constitutional Cul-de-Sac
Wood, Stepan

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Issue 2: 29.3

Making Space for Indigenous Legal Relationship with Plants in Aboriginal Law
Spalding, Pamela

Learning Law from Plants
Borrows, Lindsay

Re-Learning Reciprocity: Settler Treaty Obligations and the More-than-Human World
Askew, Hannah

Learning about Treaties with the Animal People: Lessons for Treaty 8
Gimenez, Rebeca Macias

Animals, Colonialism, and the Rule of Law
Deckha, Maneesha

The Unwritten Constitution and the More-than-Human World
Eisen, Jessica

 

 

In addition to the CCS, the following organizations supported this project:

Forum 34.1: Responsive Judicial Review

The Centre is excited to announce the publication of a new special issue of the Constitutional Forum! This special issue (34.1) flows from a workshop co-organized by the uOttawa Public Law Centre and the Centre for Constitutional Studies (uAlberta), held at uOttawa in March 2024. The workshop brought together a small group of constitutional experts to talk about Rosalind Dixon's landmark monograph, Responsive Judicial Review. This special issue comprises written versions of papers first presented at that workshop, along with a response to these papers from Professor Dixon. It encompasses reflections on a number of specific and currently contentious constitutional questions, including how courts should respond to the uptick in provincial recourse to the notwithstanding clause, the proper role of unwritten constitutional principles in judicial decision-making, and the limits that principles like democracy and federalism place on the practice of judicial review.

 

Special Issue 34.1: Responsive Judicial Review

 

Contents

 

Editors’ Introduction: Responsive Judicial Review
Richard Mailey, Vanessa MacDonnell

Living Dead Constitutionalism or Why Old Constitutional Worlds Are Never Lost for Good: A Comment on Rosalind Dixon’s Responsive Judicial Review
Jean-Christophe Bedard Rubin

Out of the Shadows: Responsive Judicial Review and the Resurgence of the Notwithstanding Clause
Marion Sandilands

The Regime Politics of Responsive Judicial Review
Geoffrey Sigalet

The Role of Democratic Majority Understandings of Rights in Rosalind Dixon’s Responsive Judicial Review
Vanessa MacDonnell

Deconstructing City of Toronto: Unwritten Constitutional Principles and Responsive Judicial Review
Richard Mailey

Responsive Judicial Review in Canada: Reflections on the Notwithstanding Clause and Beyond
Rosalind Dixon

 

 

Michael Pal Lecture Video: The New Right to Vote

Forum 33.4: Horizontal Effect and the Charter

We're delighted to announce the publication of a new special issue of the Constitutional Forum (Issue 33.4). This issue is predominantly comprised of papers by participants in a CCS workshop on the horizontal effect of Charter rights, held at UBC 's Allard School of Law in January 2024, and co-organized by professors at Allard. The workshop addressed some of the key issues surrounding the case of Cool World v Twitter, which involves a PR firm contesting Twitter's refusal to run paid ads for a documentary (The New Corporation) by arguing that Twitter's common law rights should be interpreted in a way that's consistent with the Charter value of free expression. Some of the papers address Cool World directly, while others address the surrounding legal framework derived from RWDSU v Dolphin Delivery and Hill v Church of Scientology. All engage with questions about the manner in which the Charter applies and should apply to private legal relations.

 

Editors' Introduction: Beyond Dolphin Delivery
Margot Young, Richard Mailey, Anthony Sangiuliano
i-ix

The Hidden Promise of Dolphin Delivery: Shields, Swords and Horizontal Application of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
Joel Bakan, Sujit Choudhry
1-16

Towards a Less Woolly Conception of Horizontal Effect
Johan van der Walt
17-30

A Kick in the Caboose: Recovering the Judicial Horizontality of Constitutional Equality Rights
Anthony Sangiuliano
31-48

Charter Horizontality, the Public/Private Divide, and Responding to Injustice
Sina Akbari
49-66

“We do not really know why this approach was taken”: Explaining and Modifying the Supreme Court’s Approach to the Indirect Horizontal Effect of Charter Rights
Richard Mailey
67-80

Constitutional Theory Series Videos: Teng Biao, Thomas Bustamante, and Philip Pettit

These are the first three videos from our Constitutional Theory Series, featuring Dr. Teng Biao, Professor Thomas Bustamante, and Professor Philip Pettit.

These sessions were co-organized with Professor Josh Nichols (McGill Law).

New sessions will resume in Fall 2025.

Debra Thompson Videos: Race, Democracy, and Politics without Guarantees

Professor Debra Thompson (McGill University, Political Science) delivered a public lecture through the CCS on Nov 27, 2024. The first video below is her full lecture; the second video is her response to an audience question about the 2024 US election.