Conference - March 2-3, 2012

Women, The Charter, and CEDAW in the 21st Century: Taking Stock and Moving Forward

Faculty of Law, Queen’s University
128 Union Street (Macdonald Hall, Room 001)
Kingston, Ontario, Canada

*Click here to download the schedule in PDF format.*

This conference is open to anyone interested in equality and women’s issues, including students, faculty, members of community organizations, workers, policy analysts, managers and administrators, government employees, and professionals.

Please register in advance with Melissa Howlett at melissa.howlett@queensu.ca. There are no registration fees for students, those on low incomes, or voluntary workers; those who can afford to contribute toward the food expenses of this conference are asked to pay a $50 registration fee upon arrival. Information on conference hotel rates can be obtained from Ms. Howlett.

Purpose of this conference:

Women’s equality rights have now been recognized in international treaties like the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), regional covenants, growing numbers of national constitutions, and the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action in governmental and nongovernmental governance for as many as six decades. Courts, governments, and civil society are increasingly expected to behave in nondiscriminatory ways, and legal remedies for discrimination appear to abound.

At the same time, economic inequality is rising, wealth is becoming more concentrated in the hands of fewer individuals, and fundamental cultural, religious, race-, sex-, and ability-based divides still exist despite the practices of globalization.

This conference brings law students, students from other areas of study, members of community groups and nongovernmental organizations, practicing and academic lawyers, policy analysts, equality experts, and interdisciplinary experts together to assess the state of gender equality, and to identify existing priorities and strategies for advancing well-being on all relevant dimensions.

With leading gender experts from across Canada and from Sweden, Ghana, and Taiwan, this conference will probe the roles played by race, immigration status, Aboriginal heritage, education, family composition, and other factors in shaping the status of women, and will identify policies and practices best calculated to remove existing obstacles to equality.  Key questions range from the role of economic crises in shifting perceptions and opportunities to how emerging environmental, security, justice, and regulatory issues affect women as compared with men.

Contact Bita Amani (amanib@queensu.ca) or Kathleen Lahey (kal2@queensu.ca) with any questions.

Date and location:

This conference will be held at Queen’s University Faculty of Law, Kingston, Ont., from Friday March 2 at noon until Saturday March 3 at 5:00 pm, 2012.

Speaker Biographies and Abstracts

 

Program Details

Friday Mar. 2, 2012

12:00 to 1:00 pm:

Registration and Lunch

1:00 to 2:20 pm:

• CEDAW, Constitutional Rights, Gender Mainstreaming, and Gender Budgeting
• Asa Gunnarsson, International Visiting Scholar, Queen’s University, professor, Faculty Law, Umea University, and founder, the international FemTax network --- ‘Women and Equality: Why Taxation, Social Transfers, and  Government Budgets Matter’

2:20 to 2:40 pm:

Coffee break

2:40 to 4:15 pm:

CEDAW, Constitutional Equality Guarantees, Challenges, and Outcomes

• Lucie Lamarche, professor, Gordon F. Henderson Human Rights Chair, and Research Director of the Human Rights Research and Education Centre, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa – ‘The Canadian Experience and CEDAW: Internationalisation by Default’
• Esther Ofei-Aboagye, Director, Institute of Local Government Studies, Legon, Ghana --- ‘Gender Budgeting Efforts in Ghana: Putting our Money Where our Mouths Are?’
• Kathleen Lahey, professor, Faculty of Law, Queen’s University, and co-director, Feminist Legal Studies Queen’s ‘”Going for Growth” and “Tackling Inequality” – Why Gender Equality Matters’
• Deirdre Bryden, Archivist (University Records), Queen’s University Archives — ‘Archives as Augur: Using the Archival Record to Examine the Past and Predict the Future of Women’s Employment Equity at Queen’s University’
• Elizabeth Shilton, lawyer, Law Foundation of Ontario Senior Fellow, Queen’s Centre for the Law in the Contemporary Workplace ---- ‘Women, Pensions, and Economic Equality’

4:20 to 5:20 pm:

Body Burdens and Equality:  Food and Climate

• Bita Amani, professor, Faculty of Law, Queen’s University, and co-director, Feminist Legal Studies Queen’s --- ‘New Foods, Body Burdens, and Gender Equality’
• Nathalie Chalifour, professor, Faculty of Law, Centre for Environmental Law and Global Sustainability, and Director of Graduate Program in Environmental Sustainability, Institute of the Environment, University of Ottawa --- 'Climate Justice for Women in Canada'

5:30 to 7:00 pm:

Dinner and dinner speaker:

University Club at Queen's, 168 Stuart Street (for directions, visit http://g.co/maps/96xc7)

• Margaret Denike, professor, Department of Political Science, and Coordinator, Law and Society Program, Dalhousie University --- ‘Changing Bodies, Changing Minds: Queer Theory and the Politics of Affect’

7:20 to 8:45 pm:

The Evening Show: Women and Sports: Images, Barriers, and Triumphs

• Erin Durant, Queen’s Law '11, Student-at-Law, Borden Ladner Gervais, Ottawa, and expert in women and sport, and
• Kalen Ingram, Queen’s Law ’12 --- ‘The IOC and Sex Discrimination in Sport: Canada and the UK’
• Andrea Wheeler, Queen’s Law ’12 --- ‘The Lingerie Football League and Safety --- The Difference Sex Seems to Make’
• Laura Robinson, author, sports journalist, and competitive athlete --- ‘National Dream or Nightmare: Sexual Violence and the Glorification of Hockey at the Vancouver Olympics and Stanley Cup Playoffs’
• Nikki Dryden, lawyer, competitive athlete, and human rights advocate --- ‘Follow the Money: Why Money and not Sport Drives the IOC’

Saturday Mar. 3, 2012

8:00 to 9:00 am:

Registration

Foyer, Faculty of Law

9:00 to 10:30 am:

“Mind the Gaps”:  From Promises to Practices of Gender Equality in International Law

• Jena McGill, professor, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa; previously worked at the United Nations International Law Commission, Geneva — ‘UN Women: Rhetorical Commitments or Equality-based Change?’
• Jennifer Bond, professor, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa; visiting professor, University of Michigan; co-director of the Refugee Interview Support Project; previously worked with the United Nations Refugee Agency, Damascus, Syria — ‘Securing Consistency for Consistent Security: Gender and the Responsibility to Protect’
• Jamie Liew, professor, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa; previously founded Galldin Liew LLP, a feminist legal practice in Ottawa; worked on the Sesay Defence Team at the Special Court in Sierra Leone and with the Cornwall Ont. Public Inquiry — ‘Gender-based Persecution: a Generalized Risk or Basis for Refugee Protection?’
• Kate McInturff, Amnesty International Canada and foreign affairs specialist — ‘International Law and Women’s Human Rights: Canada’s “Maternal Health” Initiative, the Promise vs the Practice’

10:30 to 10:45 am:

Coffee break

Law, student lounge

10:45 to 11:45 am (A):

Aboriginal Women: Equality Strategies

• Sarah Morales, professor, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa; former clerk, Pasqua Yaqui Tribal Appellate Court; former counsel, Hul’qumi’num Treaty Group, the National Centre for First Nations Governance, and Cowichan Tribes — ‘International Human Rights and Indigenous Women: How the UNDRIP and CEDAW can help Reclaim our “Stolen Sisters”’
• Cynthia Westaway, Barrister and Solicitor, Borden Ladner, Ottawa, and expert in First Nations and human rights issues, and
• Teresa Edwards, Director of International Affairs and Human Rights and In-House Counsel, Native Women's Association of Canada — ‘Aboriginal Women in Business: Forging Ahead’

10:45 to 11:45 am (B):

Immigration Policy and Gender: Priorities and Violence

• Sharry Aiken, professor, Faculty of Law, Queen’s University — ‘Who is Family? A Critique of Canada’s Shifting Immigration Priorities’
• Pamela Hrick, Queen’s Law ‘12 — ‘Changes to Canada’s Immigration Laws: Implications for Women in Abusive Relationships’

11:45 to 12:45 pm:

Lunchtime roundtable: What does Feminism have to do with it?  Why we need Feminism in Law

• Pamela Hrick, Queen’s Law ‘12
• Julie Lassonde, lawyer and Executive Director, Maison d’hébergement pour femmes Francophones
• Pam Cross, lawyer, National Association of Women and the Law, and Legal Counsel, Luke’s Place Legal Clinic
• Zoe Pallaire, Queen’s Law ’12

12:45 to 1:45 pm:

Women, Religion, and Equality: Religious Arbitration and the NS case

• Amanda Dale, lawyer, Executive Director, Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic, and Masters in International Human Rights, and
• Pamela Cross, lawyer, National Association of Women and the Law, and Legal Counsel, Luke’s Place Legal Clinic – ‘Religious Arbitration, the NS case, and Women’s Equality’

1:45 to 3:00 pm (A):

Women, Religion, and Governance: Equality Issues

• Yael C.B. Machtinger, Department of Socio-Legal Studies,York University --- ‘To Count or not to Count? Measuring the Prevalence of Jewish Divorce Refusal’
• Farah Deeba Chowdhury, PhD Candidate, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University — 'Implementing CEDAW in a Muslim Majority Country: The Case of Bangladesh'

1:45 to 3:00 pm (B):

Stigma, Stereotyping, and Equality

• Gayle MacDonald, professor, St. Thomas University, Department of Sociology, and Laura Winters, PhD candidate, University of New Brunswick, Sociology — ‘Stigma, Sex Work, and Criminalization: Will Sex Workers ever Achieve Equality?’
• Beverley Baines, professor, Faculty of Law, and former Head, Gender Studies, Queen’s University — ‘The BC Polygamy Decision and Women’s Agency in Law’

3:00 to 3:30 pm:

Coffee break

3:30 to 5:15 pm:

Sexual Assault and Equality

• Elizabeth Archampong, professor, Faculty of Law, KNUST, Kumasi, Ghana,
• Jennifer Koshan, professor, Faculty of Law, University of Calgary, and
• Melanie Randall, professor, Faculty of Law, University of Western Ontario — ‘Spousal Sexual Assault in Canada and Ghana:  An Equality Analysis of Criminal Law Reforms’
• Chih-Chieh, Carol, Lin, professor, Faculty of Law, National Chiao-Tung University, Taiwan --- ‘A Due Process Reform Causes an Undue Outcome: A Feminist Critique of Rape Trials and Injustice in Taiwan’
• Isabel Grant, professor, Faculty of Law, University of British Columbia, and Janine Benedet, professor, Faculty of Law, University of British Columbia — ‘Capacity to Consent in the Criminal Law of Sexual Assault and Women with Mental Disabilities: A Situational Approach’

5:15 to 5:30 pm:

Conference closing