Announcements
Course Description
This seminar will engage students in a critical analysis of the legal system's response to issues of economic justice and social inclusion. The course begins with an overview of poverty in Canada-the distribution and definition of poverty in Canada and the broader political debate around poverty in Canada. The next section of the course looks at a number of concepts and issues critical to legal and political consideration of poverty: the Canadian social welfare state, social citizenship, and social and economic rights. The following weeks focus on specific topics and case studies. For example, the Gosselin decision is the focus of one week, with other weeks examining such things as homelessness and panhandling, legal aid provision, Aboriginal women, and the domestic importance of international human rights obligations. Finally, the course will consider more directly legal activism and, more specifically, the use of litigation as a mechanism for social rights accountability and progressive social change. We will have a number of guests from local anti-poverty and public interest law community groups.
Course Materials
Poverty: Rights, Social Citizenship and Legal Activism (UBC Press: 2007)
The course is built around this recent edited collection of articles by academics and social activists. The book can be purchased from the UBC Bookstore. It is also on reserve in the Law Library.