November 23, 2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Toronto - In a landmark Supreme Court decision in September, 1997, judicial independence was recognized as a fundamental norm in the Canadian constitutional order. Current events in Pakistan are now an acute reminder of the critical importance of judicial independence, yet it is a concept that is rarely analyzed in any systematic way.
On Nov 29-30, 2007, the U of T Faculty of Law will examine the connection between judicial independence and democracy, and Canada's link to broader events around the world. The conference - Looking Back, Looking Forward: Judicial Independence in Canada and the World - will bring together scholars, students, lawyers, judges and policy-makers from Canada and around the world.
"The events in Pakistan over the past month emphasize the need for an independent judiciary," says Lorne Sossin, professor and one of the conference organizers. "When judges and lawyers are arrested and imprisoned, it is an urgent reminder of the function and purpose of the justice system. There is a need to keep this issue at the forefront of discussion among our colleagues from Canada and throughout the world," says Professor Adam Dodek, a visiting scholar at the faculty of law.
The keynote presentation will be made by Richard J. Goldstone, former Justice of the Constitutional Court of South Africa and former Chief Prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the author of For Humanity: Reflections of a War Crimes Investigator.
A panel discussion on Judicial Independence and Democracy will be moderated by Patrick Monahan, Dean - Osgoode Hall Law School with guests John Honderich Past Publisher - The Toronto Star, Professor Janice Gross Stein, Director - Munk Centre, University of Toronto and Professor Lorraine E. Weinrib - Faculty of Law, University of Toronto.
Additional sessions with local and international legal scholars will be held on: The Provincial Judges Reference Ten Years Later, Current Issues in Judicial Independence, New Frontiers in Judicial Independence, and Challenges to Judicial Independence Around the World.
Professors Lorne Sossin and Adam Dodek, co-coordinators of the conference, say that while the issue of 'judicial activism' is mentioned in the press on occasion, there is a need for greater understanding of what is at stake when judicial independence is compromised and that there is a clear a desire among legal professionals to keep the issue in the foreground of legal scholarship in Canada and around the world.
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For more information, please contact:
Jane Kidner, Assistant Dean-External Relations
(416) 978-6702
j.kidner@utoronto.ca
Laura Rosen Cohen, Communications Officer
(416) 946-5722
laura.rosencohen@utoronto.ca
For more information, visit the conference web page:
http://www.law-lib.utoronto.ca/conferences/judicial_independence/
