Your search

This paper offers a legal pluralist description of the transformation of Canadian labour arbitration over the second half of the twentieth century from an institution of the workplace to an institution of the state. Industrial employment and contractual relations are often described as creating a ‘law of the shop’, or as developing a ‘web of rules’ to govern interactions. These rules are a mix of state law, negotiated norms between employers and employee representatives, amongst workers themselves, and a host of other social and economic forces operating to organize relations at both the industrial and workplace level. Labour arbitrators, appointed and paid for by the parties to interpret collective bargaining agreements, historically expert in the dynamics of the workplace, and concerned with the long term relationships of the parties, have traditionally acted as translators of sorts. Labour arbitration sat at the intersection of the ‘law of the shop’ and the law of the state. Arbitrators acted to translate and mediate between the overarching principles of state law and the terms negotiated by the workplace parties, seeking to use the language and concepts of each so as to protect the system of private contracting from unwanted judicial interference. Towards the end of the 20th century, however, the increasing number of individual statutory rights regime (particularly human rights law) and the expanded scope of arbitral jurisdiction, has served to legalize this previously informal institution, and to effectively pull it into the service of the state’s law.

Plusieurs fois au cours des dernières années chacune de nous a parcouru avec beaucoup de plaisir un premier exemplaire des Cahiers de la femmes/CWS sur les femmes autochtones. Ce magazine a toujours encouragé l'écriture des femmes autochtones depuis le premier article des femmes Mohawks de Kanawake dans le deuxième numéro des Cahiers bien avant la mode des écrits autochtones. Les années ont passé et beaucoup de choses ont changé. On compte de plus en plus de femmes autochtones qui écrivent et le nombre de textes soumis pour ce numéro en est la preuve. C'est un encouragement porté par l'espoir. Un des thèmes les plus évidents de ce numéro porte sur l'importance de vivre nos traditions autochtones. Ce message omniprésent, que ce soit dans un article sur les arts ou sur la loi, n'était pas apparent dans le premier numéro sur les femmes autochtones. Un autre thème prouve que notre écriture n'est pas dissociée de notre quotidien. Nous sommes des activistes et ce numéro est sûrement une célébration des femmes activistes autochtones. Ce ne fut pas tâche facile d'organiser les sections de ce numréro à cause des liens à établir Quel défi que de vouloir catégoriser le travail autochtone ! Dans une perspective holistique chacun des articles aurait pu se retrouver dans les quatre sections et chaque section aurait pu être reliée à l'autre. Raconter des histoires par exemple, est de l'activisme et chaque histoire dans ce Cahier est engagée dans un processus de partage de nos savoirs pour le changement. En outre, les savoirs autochtones prennent leur source dans le principe de "toute ma famille"; la gouvernance implique l'application des savoirs autochtones; les arts expriment notre relation avec nos familles et ainsi de suite. Cela dit, nous espérons que les lectrices et les lecteurs apprécieront les catégories choisies. Nous croyons qu'elles offrent une nouvelle approche à notre activisme, à nos légendes, à notre savoir et à nos familles.

Le 11 juin 2008, le Premier ministre Stephen Harper au nom du peuple canadien a présenté des excuses à l'égard des enfants autochtones jadis gardés dans des pensionnats. Les ministres de l'opposition Stéphane [Stephane Dion], Jack Layton et Gilles Duceppe ont fait de même. Tous les chefs des organisations nationales d'autochtones ont réagi positivement à cet exercice public. En sa qualité de présidente nationale de l'Associations de femmes autochtones du Canada, l'auteure a eu la responsabilité de diffuser ce message afin que tous en prennent connaissance. Elle en fut honorée et au nom des femmes autochtones du Canada elle a parlé du fond du coeur en témoignant de l'impact de ce système scolaire spécialement sur les femmes autochtones. I then had to reflect on my own personal upbringing and heard about the horrendous abuses that my own grandmother and her siblings had to endure while they attended the "Mush Hole," the Mohawk Institute in Brantford, Ontario. I also reflected and reviewed my matrilineal family and the affects that these abuses had on my mother, her siblings and their families. My grandmother and mother had already passed away when I began to realize the intergenerational impacts, so I wasn't able to have direct conversations with them about this issue. I am not sure my grandmother would have wanted to talk about it anyway. I was, however, able to sit with my uncle, my grandmother's brother, and he told me many horrible stories. I began to understand how much was stolen from my matriarchal family as a result of my grandmother attending the Mush Hole. It became a reality that our traditional form of educating our children through language and traditional teachings that were supposed to be taught to us by our grandmother was stolen from her; her language was sexually beaten from her and her spirit was beaten by a system designed to destroy her. She was a Mohawk girl whose life was taken from us by genocidal policies of the Canadian government and religious denominations of churches. Most Canadians became a little educated on June 11, 2008 about the assimilationist policy of the Canadian government. Being that this is one of the most troubling "black marks" against Canada, every Canadian person should be knowledgeable that the human rights violations that occurred against Aboriginal children is as a result of Canada's genocidal policies. Every Canadian person should know its impacts on Aboriginal peoples, and more specifically on Aboriginal women. Everyone should know that the negative issues of the poverty, alcoholism, drug addiction and the cycle of violence can be traced back to Canada's policies. We can even trace the issue of missing and murdered Aboriginal women to the residential school system. All of this must be mandatorily taught in all Canadian schools. It shouldn't have taken until the year 2008 for most Canadians to be educated about the residential school system.

At the time of their civil divorce, Mr. Marcovitz and Ms. Bruker entered into an agreement concerning custody, access, division of property and support. Their agreement also included an undertaking by each to appear before the Beth Din (rabbinical court) for the purpose of obtaining a get, or divorce, under Jewish law. For their marriage to be dissolved under Jewish law, it was necessary for Mr. Marcovitz to provide, and Ms. Bruker to accept, a “bill of divorce”, or get. Without a get neither party could remarry in the faith, and any subsequent intimate relationship entered into by either of them would be considered adulterous and any children born of that relationship would be viewed a illegitimate.

Freedom of conscience or religion is no longer protected as the most effective way for the individual to discover spiritual truth, or as necessary to his meaningful commitment to that truth, or because human conscience, the capacity to recognize truth and right, is a divine endowment. The public justification for religious freedom is now framed in more secular terms. In the contemporary context of spiritually diverse community, the protection of religious belief or commitment is most often said to be based on the value of individual judgment or autonomy. What the individual chooses, what she judges to be right or true, is deserving of respect because it has been chosen, because it is an expression of her autonomy or the outcome of her independent judgment.