Program & Abstracts

Paper Title:

“Reiterating ethics, the rule of law & professionalism in legal educational training in Africa: Calibrating reforms for good”.

Presenter(s):

E. Kofi Abotsi, (Dean, UPSA Law School, Accra-Ghana).

Abstract:

In an era of deepening threats to judicial independence, corruption scandals, and the erosion of public confidence in legal institutions across the African continent, legal education in Africa faces a pivotal reckoning. This paper, urges the urgent recalibration of curricula and training models to embed and mainstream ethics, the rule of law, and professionalism as foundational imperatives, shifting from ineffectual theoretical silos to transformative, Afrocentric pedagogy that counters predatory and exploitative behavior so rampant within the legal profession. Grounded in the African Union’s Constitutive Act commitment to the rule of law and drawing parallels with the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Standards for Approval of Law Schools—particularly Standard 301’s mandate for “effective, ethical, and responsible participation” in the profession, I interrogate the dearth of substantive rule of law values and ethical considerations in professional training at the Bar among African law schools and how this has overtime deeply impacted on the outlook and character of the legal profession on the continent. In this regard, I argue that overreliance on doctrinal rote learning at the expense of training-level ethical internalization continues to gravely impact the concrete realization of the rule of law and professional values among lawyers and judges in Africa.  

I accordingly advocate a pan-African reform paradigm which emphasizes (1) compulsory, ethics-infused clinical programs incorporating rule-of-law dynamics such as access to justice and human rights; (2) A training focus which emphasizes professional responsibility such as providing pro bono services to indigent citizens, and (3) sustained mentorship ecosystems tied to continental codes, such as the ABA Model Rules adapted for African contexts, emphasizing pro bono duties and law reform advocacy, and cultural adaptability. By mainstreaming the rule of law and ethical considerations in legal training, African law schools can reinforce compliance, optimize the general responsibility of lawyers and promote the rule of law in justice delivery and the legal system generally.

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Paper Title:

N/A

Presenter(s):

Shauna Van Praagh, (President of the Law Commission of Canada and Professor of Law, McGill University).

Abstract:

How can a Law Commission of Canada support shared commitments to rule of law? One of the things it can do is support meaningful and perhaps surprising connections between legal education and law reform. Law reform is often understood in a narrow way, disconnected from the teaching and learning of law; conversely, legal education is rarely explicitly described as linked to law reform. Reimagining the connections might shape the burden that justice-ready holders of law degrees carry on their shoulders: an ongoing obligation to sustain and demonstrate rule of law in the service of a free and democratic society. While we all participate in ongoing evolution of law, law students and jurists have specialized responsibilities to guide that evolution of law with a rule of law sensibility. The Law Commission takes on a stewardship role in supporting law schools and the crucial work of informing and sustaining rule of law throughout Canada and beyond.

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Paper Title:

“Exploring the Critically Important Roles of Law Schools in Advancing the Rule of Law”.

Presenter(s):

Kernaghan Webb (Toronto Metropolitan University), Errol Mendes (University of Ottawa), Bennett Freeman and John F. Sherman.

Abstract:

Given the foundationally important role that law schools play in educating future lawyers, it perhaps goes without saying that ensuring that the substantive content of law courses devoted to addressing rule of law-related issues reflects the latest developments and thinking on this topic. This having been said, recent actions by the current U.S. Administration directed at certain American universities and their students (i.e., arrests of students, threats of withdrawals of funds to American universities, as well as judicial and administrative responses to these actions), as well as Canadian and American university responses to students and professors engaging in freedom of speech-type activities, and the shooting and killing of a high-profile American commentator on a U.S. university while answering student questions, are highly suggestive of the need for law schools -- and the broader educational institutions they are part of – to not only reflect such developments in their teaching activities, but also to revisit and recalibrate campus-student and university-government relations so that higher education institutions can provide an optimal learning environment for their students. More broadly, the threats of the current U.S. Administration directed at law firms, and the myriad other rule of law-eroding actions of the current U.S. Administration are indicative of a broader, troubling rule of law-based contextual threat to the vibrant learning atmosphere which is essential to teaching and research in law schools and universities in the United States, Canada and beyond. The purpose of this paper and presentation is to parse out, examine, and propose possible roles and approaches for law schools and universities to adopt in response to these recent developments. This includes discussion of substantive teaching and research on rule of law topics, approaches to addressing student and professor freedom of expression-related activities, structuring of law school and university-wide interactions with governments on rule of law related issues, and possible participation in broader, multi-actor coalitions directed at preserving the integrity of the rule of law.       

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Paper Title:

“The Landscape of Legislative Drafting: Responding to Crisis in the Rule of Law”. 

Presenter(s):

David Marcello (Adjunct Professor of Law, Tulane University, Executive Director, The Public Law Center).

Abstract:

For over three decades, The Public Law Center (TPLC) has taught Legislative and Administrative Advocacy to second and third-year students at Tulane Law School and has trained legislative drafters from 100+ jurisdictions at its International Legislative Drafting Institute:  https://law.tulane.edu/international-legislative-drafting-institute. TPLC is a nexus of academic and pragmatic learning. We impart to law students and legislative drafters alike a good understanding of how drafting strengthens legislative instruments to defend the Rule of Law. 

Plain language drafting is central in the classroom and the Institute. Plain language instructional “silos” convey techniques that improve drafting—and the quality of legislation. But after a brief consideration of two such silos (“Characteristics of Good Legal Writing” and “Gender Neutral Drafting”), this presentation pivots to a broader focus: “How should we teach students and train drafters in a landscape where the Rule of Law is under existential threat?” Plain language drafting is necessary, but not sufficient in such a moment. 

I adopted this “landscape” focus in a 1996 article that challenged the stereotypical notion of drafter as “scribe.” I found discretionary and political influences in the legislative drafting process that led me to conclude, “the relationship between drafter and text [is] the furthest thing from a technical, value-neutral enterprise.”¹  

My current focus is on a different landscape—one external to the drafting process. My thesis is that an international assault on Rule of Law demands more assertive responses from drafters, including their aggressive engagement with policy and procedure. My perspective raises ethical questions about the drafter’s proper role.  

Drafters already play an aggressive role in the “writing” or compositional part of legislative drafting, often using plain language techniques without “permission” from their legislative bosses. But what about drafters who assert themselves in the “thinking” or policy part of the process? Have they overstepped? Breached ethics? I’ll use a case study from Michigan in the 2020 US Presidential election to illuminate some answers. We’ll consider the ethical and pragmatic implications of a more aggressive role for drafters at a time when due process is under siege and the pillars of democracy are threatened. And I’ll conclude with an anecdote from Tbilisi, Georgia that demonstrates how even an apparently anodyne subject such as “plain language drafting” can exert a powerful “political” influence on the Rule of Law. 

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Paper Title:

“Rethinking the Applicability of Section 8 of the Canadian Charter for the Information Age and Beyond”.

Presenter(s):

François Tanguay-Renaud (Professor and Associate Dean Research, Osgoode Hall Law School).

Abstract:

The Supreme Court of Canada’s interpretation of the right to be secure against unreasonable search and seizure guaranteed by section 8 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms has remained fairly stable since the adoption of the Charter. Or at least, that is how the Court’s section 8 jurisprudence to date makes it seem. Yet, in some recent decisions dealing with digital communications and the internet—culminating in the 2024 case of R. v. Bykovets—the Court has, implicitly, brought into question the foundational principle based on which the right has historically been circumscribed. Or so I argue in this article, contending further that this development should be applauded and pave the way for a rethinking of the scope of applicability of the section.

In section I, I explain the orthodox position about the applicability of section 8 and outline key controversies that arose in its development and have since remained unaddressed. I then seek to problematize the position further by identifying some questionable implications that the Court has held it to have over the years. In section II, I situate and review the recent decision in Bykovets and show how it invites a rethinking of the scope of applicability of section 8. In section III, I argue that the logic of the Bykovets majority opinion should lead the Supreme Court to expand the reach of 8 section to all non-accidental gatherings of information about individuals by the state. In an era in which, more than ever before, information is power, I argue that, for section 8 to protect us meaningfully against unjustified informational overreach by the state, all such collections should be subject to the rule of law and the attendant possibility of judicial control.

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Paper Title:

"Empowering our Law Students and the Rule of Law: Designing a Public Interest Toolkit for Competition Act Private Actions".

Presenter(s):

Gil Lan (Associate Professor of Law and Business Department, Ted Rogers School of Management; Lincoln Alexander School of Law, Toronto Metropolitan University).

Abstract:

From 2020-2023, the Canadian Government amended the Competition Act and broadened the scope of private actions to allow ordinary citizens to bring cases for offenses such as abuse of dominance, deceptive marketing practices and anti-competitive agreements. These rights came into force on June 20, 2025. Once the sole purview of the Competition Commissioner, the right to bring actions for these offenses serves as a potential guardrail against the concentration of power in a market-driven society. This is significant because the private tort of conspiracy and related causes of action were strictly circumscribed by common law courts. Now, private actions for these anti-competitive actions can be initiated by private individuals and ultimately appealed to courts. In this way, the Act now provides for a stronger separation of powers between the judiciary and executive.  It also provides another rule of law benefit: increased access to justice for the public - thus operationalizing the key societal benefits the Act was intended to confer. Most notably, the new provisions allow private actions to be brought if the moving party can demonstrate a “public interest” – further bolstering the potential to support rule of law aligned causes. 1But we are in new territory - these rights of private action are  new. In this presentation I suggest that law schools can play an important role in preparing law students for this significant development.  My suggestions include developing a public interest toolkit that assists students in drafting and bringing these specific actions before the Competition Tribunal and courts, drafting input on consultations requested by the Competition Bureau, integrating short Competition Law insights such as these in other courses (Civil procedure, class actions etc.) and developing a list of methods in which rule of law aspirations may be pursued through the Act.

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Paper Title:

“The Last Mile: There Is No Rule of Law Without Access to Justice”.

Presenter(s):

Kathleen Rubenstein (Visiting Fellow, Northeastern University of Law, Center for Public Interest Advocacy and Collaboration).

Abstract:

Law schools can advance the Rule of Law by bringing sustained focus to how the law is touching regular people’s lives. Centering the World Justice Project’s pillar of “equal justice” is an important, but all-too-often overlooked complement to legal academics’ scholarship and teaching focused on the most powerful institutions, individuals, and courts. Rhetorically, discourse on “defending” democracy and “threats to” the rule of law isn’t landing especially well in the US; it’s not galvanizing to either the public or law students, for opposite reasons. For members of the public, it negates most American’s lived experience of the access to justice chasm, and their numerous experiences where the law failed to shape their lives in a fair manner. For students, it feels hopelessly elite and esoteric; they rightly surmise they will never touch a Supreme Court case or advise the White House. By contrast, people-centered advocacy for future systems that deliver equal justice will make democracy and Rule of Law come alive for a broader constituency of law school stakeholders including alumni, students, counterparts throughout their university who lack legal training, and local community members. By marrying calls for Rule of Law with a trenchant focus on equal justice, we can envision and demand much more sweeping access to justice than has heretofore found political consensus in the US. Finally, I’ll offer an intersectional and critical analysis of some salient distinctions between these justice movements, along lines of race and gender.

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Paper Title:

"Rethinking the Rule of Law: Incorporating Indigenous Legal Perspectives"

Presenter(s):

Lindsay Borrows, Professor, Queen's University Faculty of Law

Abstract:

Indigenous Peoples in Canada and the United States have always had their own legal orders. Colonial legal systems have attempted to displace Indigenous legalities through imposed laws, policies, and the whims of State leaders of the era. This discussion considers how civil "dis"obedience might, at times, be obedience to Indigenous legal orders. I ask, whose community and which laws are the focus of the rule of law? How does the lived experience of Indigenous Peoples who lack access to the justice system impact the rule of law? How might law schools support belief in the rule of law, while strengthening understandings of the complexity of the colonial State that is Canada and the United States? 

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Paper Title:

"Political Polarization, Public Opinion and the Rule of Law

Presenter(s):

Cherie Metcalf, Professor, Queen's University Faculty of Law

Abstract:

Drawing on empirical evidence, the connection between political polarization and perceptions of the courts is discussed as an element of the rule of law. Broad public trust in the courts and the legal system is vital to the rule of law. How might rising politicization of legal disputes affect this relationship? Emerging evidence suggests that pubic trust in the courts is more vulnerable to erosion than it has been in the past. Law schools must engage students in thinking about how the legal system is perceived by the public and can play an institutional role in preserving public trust in the legal system.

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Paper Title:

“Beyond Courts: Legal Education and the Rule of Law”.

 Presenter(s):

Amitpal C. Singh (SJD Candidate, Harvard Law School)

Abstract:

Legal education in Canada is intensely focused on judges, courts, and the chief province of judicial power, i.e., the common law. This focus means that legal education is failing to achieve its full ability to be a bulwark against the rule of law. This article argues that a healthier legal pedagogy—one that is better oriented to producing a legal system that acts as a bulwark against the state—would emphasize heretofore neglected aspects of Canadian legal education, including statutory interpretation, the interpretation of administrative regulation, and the laws governing municipal and parliamentary bodies. Canadian law students are highly adept at reading appellate court judgements, but their law schools teach them considerably less about executive action, the laws governing parliamentary powers, and parsing administrative and statutory text. Indeed, this lopsided emphasis is reflected in what constitutes the mandatory J.D. curriculum, versus what is merely optional, at most Canadian law schools. The present emphasis on the common law and court adjudication in legal education has privileged one institution—the (appellate) courts, and our apex court in particular—while marginalizing others. The institutions associated with statutory interpretation, administrative regulation, and executive power—the legislature, administrative tribunals, and federal and provincial agencies have, therefore, been neglected as a possible bulwark against threats to the rule of law. As threats to the rule of law evolve to avoid the reach of courts, lawyers must be equipped to use the full panoply of institutions that may act as a bulwark against those threats. Canadian legal education, with its present preoccupation with the appellate courts, has led to the atrophy of crucial legal skills, essential to navigating the wide variety of legal institutions available to combat threats to the rule of law. As the American experience has demonstrated, putting our metaphorical rule of law eggs in one basket—namely, the courts, and an apex court in particular—can have disappointing results.

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Paper Title:

“Academic Freedom Under Siege: There and Here”.

 Presenter(s):

Sharry Aiken, Professor, Queen’s University Faculty of Law  

Abstract:

Academic freedom is widely recognized as the foundation stone of democratic societies, supporting intellectual progress and underpinning the exercise of other fundamental rights. Globally, 171 of 193 UN member states have made a legally binding commitment under the UN Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) to “respect the freedom indispensable for scientific research and creative activity” (Article 15.3). Yet, more than 40% of the global population lives in countries where academic freedom is completely restricted. For 2024, the Academic Freedom Index identified downward trends in 34 countries and improvements in only eight (FAU, Academic Freedom Index, Update 2025). This decline is driven by a constellation of factors including social polarization, the rise of anti-pluralist political movements, the destabilization of democratic norms, and fraying of the rules-based international order. In Canada, external pressures on academic freedom have intensified, echoing global trends. These have included governmental interference in research agendas, external donor influence on hiring and conferences, reprisals for “extramural” academic speech, restrictions on campus protest, and targeted online harassment of academic staff (Horn 1999; Drummond 2013; Axelrod 2021; Human Rights Watch 2021; CAUT, March 2025). This presentation will examine these emerging threats and highlight the critical role public universities (and their law faculties) should play as guardians of both academic freedom and the broader legal and democratic frameworks upon which just societies depend.

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Paper Title:

“Advancing the Rule of Law: The Role of Law School Tax Law Clinics”. 

Presenter(s):

Dr. Amir Pichhadze (Research Assistant, York University)

Abstract:

There are different ways by which societies could be governed. One of these is governance based on the ‘rule of law’. Almost a decade ago, members of the United Nations (“UN”) reaffirmed their commitment to this approach and declared it to be indispensable for establishing a “peaceful, prosperous and just world.”1  Governance by the ‘rule of law’ requires, among other things, that “legal institutions and their procedures should be available to ordinary people to uphold their rights, settle their disputes, and protect them against abuses of public and private power.”2 In other words, people and legal entities should have access to justice.    According to the World Justice Project, which ranks the conditions of the rule of law in countries around the world, Canada’s conditions of access to justice ranks only 25th in the world and has been in decline in recent years.3 There are different ways by which access to justice could be improved. For example, the federal government provides funding to provinces so that they can provide legal aid for people with law income;4 though these services are arguably limited in availability and scope. Law Schools also operate some university-based law clinics, though these as well are limited in scope. For example, there are hardly any (if at all) Pro Bono clinics that are operated through law schools and provide tax related services, though student societies at Canadian universities typically provide some limited tax services to students. These, however, are limited in scope. They mainly focus on assisting students with filing tax returns. This is a missed opportunity because law schools are in a position to provide Pro Bono tax services which are more comprehensive in the type of services they provide as well as the type of clients they serve. By creating tax law clinics, or integrating tax law services into existing law school-based clinics, law schools could significantly contribute to advancing access to justice, and consequently improving Canada’s conditions of the Rule of Law.  The purpose of my presentation is to describe the current conditions of university-based Pro Bono tax services in Canada, suggesting that existing services could and ought to be supplemented by law school-based tax clinics. To advance this objective, I will also present my research on how law school-based tax clinics operate in other countries, such as the US, UK, and Australia. This comparative analysis could help inform how to approach the creation of such clinics as well as the type of services the clinics do, can and ought to provide. When published, my suggestions aim to provide a blueprint to be followed by Canadian law schools. 

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Paper Title:

“Grappling with intersecting state, civil society, and technological incursions into university life and mission”. 

Presenter(s):

Craig Scott, Professor of Law, Osgoode Hall Law School 

Abstract:

In our fraught and evolving times, how might we think about and address not only state interference and coercion brought to bear against universities but also foreign state efforts to target students, staff, professors and entire institutions? What are the consequences for academic freedom, for civic freedoms on campus, for students’ post-graduation careers, and for the central role of legal education in forging the integrity and professional courage of future lawyers, judges, government officials, and politicians when it comes to fundamental values related to the rule of law and judicial independence? Can we (and, if so, how can we) rapidly develop inter-law school resistance to state incursion — whether by host states, foreign states, or coordinated host and foreign states — and its consequences?    

These interconnected questions having been set out at a schematic level, remarks will fill out the questions asked with a small selection of contemporary examples of methods that different actors are employing and that other actors almost certainly are noting for adoption and adaptation.  Tentative answers will be suggested in light of several seemingly parallel yet often intersecting phenomena that are part of the overall context, notably: (1) the nature and rapidly evolving capabilities of digital hacking, surveillance and disinformation technologies, including how technology company actions can dovetail or even collaborate with state and state-adjacent coercion; (2) the question of whether and when the exercise of the civic freedom of civil society actors to criticize academic institutions and their members crosses red lines when such actors coordinate mobilizations, campaigns, and even “operational missions” with state actors or indeed with any external operations that are designed to recruit students for external political and geopolitical agendas; and (3) the depth  of the hole many  universities have dug for themselves and their communities by, with good intentions and in good faith, building climates of inclusion that privilege notions of “feeling safe” in a way that has now morphed into a mirroring-effect phenomenon of almost every  sector of students (and some in the professoriate) demanding a kind of psychic comfort on campus that is incompatible with the mission of universities.  

Remarks will take as a given that attendees have read in advance the above scene-setting (alongside flashing a slide or two breaking the above down) so as to be able to launch quickly into examples of, and then tentative answers, to the problematics sketched.  

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Paper Title:

“The Unholy Trinity of the Administrative State: To advance the rule of law, challenge discretionary managerialism”.

Presenter(s):

Bruce Pardy (Professor, Faculty of Law, Queen’s University).

Abstract:

Separation of powers is one of the foundations of the rule of law. The legislature legislates. The executive executes. The judiciary adjudicates. Keeping them apart protects us. When each branch can do only its own job, power cannot concentrate. No single official or office can dictate the outcome of any specific issue or case.

But in modern Canada, separation of powers has become more apparent than real. Instead of the rule of law, we have the Unholy Trinity of the Administrative State: delegation from the legislature, deference from the courts, and discretion for the executive to decide the public good. Instead of separation, we have concentrated power. Instead of checks and balances between the three branches, they cooperate to facilitate the state’s supervision of society. “Agile governments” change rules on the fly to suit their evolving policy preferences. Broad discretion in the hands of technocratic managerial class has become the foundation of our modern system of government.

Law schools can protect and advance the rule of law by challenging the discretionary managerialism of the administrative state.

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