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Freedom of expression protects the individual's freedom to communicate with others. The right of the individual is to participate in an activity that is deeply social in character. The value of freedom of expression rests on the social nature of individuals and the constitutive character of public discourse. This understanding of the freedom, however, has been inhibited by the individualism that dominates contemporary thinking about rights its assumptions about the pre-social individual and the instrumental value of community life. While the social character of human agency is seldom mentioned in the different accounts of the freedom value, it is the unstated premise of each. Once we recognize that individual agency and identity emerge in the social relationship of communication, the traditional split between intrinsic and instrumental accounts (and between speaker and listener -based accounts) of the value of freedom of expression dissolves.
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When parents separate and cannot agree about parenting arrangements for their children, a state-authorized neutral party must resolve the dispute. Two groups of neutral professionals perform this function in many western jurisdictions. The first group is judges, who are entrusted with the ultimate decision-making authority. The second group is custody and access assessors, who are generally psychologists, psychiatrists, or social workers. This thesis compares the processes by which these two groups of professionals make the decisions, and analyzes the interface between them. It then presents the results of empirical research about the extent to which Ontario judges accept custody and access recommendations from social worker assessors employed by Ontario's Office of the Children's Lawyer. The central finding was that the judges and assessors agreed only about half of the time. Possible explanations for this finding are explored, and its significance is analyzed in the context of the existing literature.
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Professor Voyvodic’s call for cultural competence as an ethical requirement challenges perceptions of the legal profession as inherently and necessarily morally neutral. While lawyers wrestle with the boundaries of ethical mandates, alternative dispute resolution practitioners have adopted their own codes of ethics following very much in the path of the law. Although expanding dispute resolution options for disputants, many theorists have warned of the potential of informalism to undermine natural justice principals. I will argue that the choice to omit any explicit commitment to a "social justice ethic" leaves the practice of ADR vulnerable to these decades-old arguments that informalism erodes protections for marginalized populations. As such, I will argue that mediators must call for an explicit social justice mandate in their codes of conduct, training and practices to cement the place of informal processes as equitable – not just efficient – options for settlement. In doing so, informal processes, particularly mediation, may increase discourse in civil society about human rights, thus strengthening their congruence with lived realities of citizens.
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Author / Editor
- Anneke Smit (1)
- Beverly Jacobs (1)
- Brian Manarin (1)
- Christopher Waters (1)
- David Tanovich (2)
- Gemma Smyth (2)
- Irina Ceric (2)
- Jasminka Kalajdzic (5)
- Jeff Berryman (2)
- Laverne Jacobs (2)
- Noel Semple (3)
- Reem Bahdi (5)
- Richard Moon (3)
- Shanthi E. Senthe (1)
- Sujith Xavier (1)
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