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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20260116
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DTSTAMP:20260419T060405
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SUMMARY:Re-Opening the Door: Litigating Positive Rights under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms
DESCRIPTION:Litigating Positive Rights Symposium\n📅 Friday\, January 16\, 2026 · 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (ET)📍 Henry N. R. Jackman Faculty of Law\, University of Toronto (Room P120) \nOverview\nJoin leading scholars\, practitioners\, and emerging voices for a one-day symposium exploring how positive rights — rights that require governments to act — can be meaningfully advanced under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. From housing and healthcare to climate and digital regulation\, the symposium examines whether Canadian constitutionalism is ready to “re-open the door” first left ajar by the Supreme Court of Canada in Gosselin v. Québec. \nAbout the Symposium\nCo-chaired by Cheryl Milne\, Executive Director of the David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights\, and Professor David Schneiderman of the University of Toronto Henry N.R. Jackman Faculty of Law\, this event brings together experts from across Canada and abroad to address both the theory and practice of litigating positive rights claims. \nThe Symposium KEYNOTE address will be given by Prof Aoife Nolan\, (School of Law\, University of\nNottingham)\, titled Enforcing Positive Social Rights in an Anti-Democratic Era. \nPanel discussions will explore: \n\nThe conceptual divide between positive and negative rights\nLitigation strategies for social\, environmental\, and economic rights\nEvidence\, remedies\, and practical challenges in Charter claims\nComparative and international perspectives on positive obligations\n\nPlease find the AGENDA for the program here: Asper Centre Symposium Litigating Positive Rights – Agenda and the FULL PROGRAM HERE (with bios and Abstracts). \nWhy This Matters\nClimate justice\, housing insecurity\, healthcare access\, and rapidly evolving digital systems are testing the limits of a Charter framed primarily around negative rights. Rethinking positive obligations is fundamentally about imagining what kind of constitutional community Canada aspires to be — one that simply prevents state intrusion\, or one that supports human dignity through collective responsibility. \nThis symposium will inform the third volume in the Asper Centre’s publication series with Lexis Nexis Canada\, following:📘 Public Interest Litigation in Canada (2018)📘 Litigating Equality in Canada (2023) \nA modest registration fee will apply\, with reduced rates for full-time students.CPD accreditation will be sought for this program. \nMore information and Registration Here
URL:https://aspercentre.ca/event/re-opening-the-door-litigating-positive-rights-under-the-canadian-charter-of-rights-and-freedoms/
LOCATION:P120 Jackman Law Building
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Toronto:20260127T123000
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SUMMARY:Constitutional Roundtable with Professor Richard Moon
DESCRIPTION:The David Asper Centre for Constitutional Rights’ Constitutional Roundtables are an annual series of lunchtime discussion forums that provide an opportunity to consider developments in Canadian constitutional theory and practice.  The Constitutional Roundtable series promotes scholarship and aims to make a meaningful contribution to intellectual discourse about Canadian constitutional law. \nWe are pleased to be hosting Professor Richard Moon for a lunchtime Constitutional Roundtable on January 27\, 2026. \nTitle:  “The Limits of State Neutrality in Religious Matters” \nAbstract: In their early Charter of Rights judgments\, the Canadian courts described religious freedom as a liberty that has two dimensions – the freedom to engage in religious practice without state restriction (unless necessary to advance the public interest) and the freedom from state compulsion to perform a religious practice. However\, in later cases the courts have said that the freedom does not simply prohibit state coercion in matters of religion but requires also that the state remain neutral in religious matters. Religion then must be separated from politics and treated as a private matter that falls within the sphere of personal/communal life rather than the political/civic sphere. \nThe courts\, however\, have not applied the neutrality requirement in a clear or consistent way. Behind the courts’ partial or inconsistent application of the neutrality requirement lies a complex conception of religious commitment in which religion is viewed as both an aspect of the individual’s identity and as a set of judgments or beliefs made by the individual about truth and right. The challenge for the courts is to find a way to fit this complex conception of religious commitment and its value into a constitutional framework that relies on a distinction between individual choices or commitments that should sometimes be protected as a matter of liberty\, and individual attributes or traits that should sometimes be respected as a matter of equality. The constitutional framework (and perhaps more deeply\, our conception of rights) imposes this distinction\, between judgment and identity\, on the rich and complex experience of religious commitment. \nBiography:  Richard Moon is Distinguished University Professor Emeritus at the University of Windsor. His most recent books include The Life and Death of Freedom of Expression (U of T Press\, 2024)\, Freedom of Conscience and Religion\, 2nd ed.  (Irwin Law/ U of T Press\,  2024)\, a co-edited collection\,  Indigenous Spirituality and Religious Freedom (U of T Press\, 2025)\,  and a co-edited Open Access Constitutional Casebook\, CanLii Platform (2025)(involving 43 contributors) https://canlii.ca/t/7jt2q . \nAll are welcome * No RSVP Required * Light lunch provided
URL:https://aspercentre.ca/event/constitutional-roundtable-with-professor-richard-moon/
LOCATION:Flavelle FL219 – John Willis Classroom
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