Dans sa thèse, l’auteure analyse la fonction du système judiciaire dans le système juridique selon une double perspective historique et sociologique. Cette approche possède un potentiel euristique important, car elle révèle que la place réservée à la production judiciaire du droit se modifie au gré de la conception que se fait la société de l’origine et de la légitimité du droit. Grâce à la méthodologie proposée par la théorie des systèmes, il est possible d’analyser le phénomène de la montée en puissance des juges dans sa dimension scientifique, en substituant une interprétation sociologique à celle, traditionnelle, formulée par la science politique. Grâce à une réappropriation de la justice par la science juridique, la production judiciaire du droit peut être étudiée dans une perspective systémique. Celle-ci démontre la situation névralgique occupée par la fonction de juger dans le système juridique. Par le biais d’un retour aux sources de la fonction de juger, l’auteur identifie les stratégies empruntées par les titulaires de cette fonction pour maintenir et légitimer leur position dans l’organisation du système juridique. La thèse démontre que le discours judiciaire de la Cour suprême du Canada sur la norme d’indépendance judiciaire homologue la théorie de la place centrale du système judiciaire dans le système juridique. La thèse conclut enfin que des conditions sociologiques sont nécessaires pour assurer l’indépendance judiciaire et garantir la primauté du droit. Ces conditions sont la différenciation sociale, une structure de programme juridique conditionnelle et la limitation de la responsabilité des juges pour l’impact de leurs décisions dans le système social. / This thesis examines the function of the judiciary in the legal system in a historical and sociological perspective. Through the lens of history and sociology, the author reviews and considers the changes in the role of the judge in the development of law. The heuristic benefit of this approach borrowed from history and systemic theory, is invaluable. Firstly, it demonstrates that the place reserved for the judicial creation of law in the legal system is tributary to what is considered as the source and legitimacy of law. Secondly, it sets in an evolutionary perspective the significant changes that occurred in the development of law and the judicial function. The characterization of the judicial function evolves from a political science’s viewpoint to a legal perspective. Through this reappropriation by the legal science, the judicial production of law can now be examined in its systemic function. As well, exploration of the sources of the function of justice renders possible and understanding of the rationale used by judges throughout history to legitimize their position in the legal system. The thesis supports the proposition that, along with legal conditions relating to the status of judges, a set of sociological conditions must exist in order for judicial independence to be fully protected and the rule of law upheld. These conditions are social differentiation, a structure of conditional programs for law, and limitation in the social system of the responsibility and accountability of judges following the fulfillment of their judicial function. Finally, in the final stage of her socio-historical research, the author demonstrates how the current judicial interpretation of the conditions for judicial independence enhances the theoretical foundations that situate the judicial function at the centre of the legal system.

This phenomenological study explored Black male law enforcement officers’ perspectives of how racial profiling shaped their decisions to explore and commit to a law enforcement career. Criterion and snow ball sampling was used to obtain the 17 participants for this study. Super’s (1990) archway model was used as the theoretical framework. The archway model “is designed to bring out the segmented but unified and developmental nature of career development, to highlight the segments, and to make their origin clear” (Super, 1990, p. 201). Interview data were analyzed using inductive, deductive, and comparative analyses. Three themes emerged from the inductive analysis of the data: (a) color and/or race does matter, (b) putting on the badge, and (c) too black to be blue and too blue to be black. The deductive analysis used a priori coding that was based on Super’s (1990) archway model. The deductive analysis revealed the participants’ career exploration was influenced by their knowledge of racial profiling and how others view them. The comparative analysis between the inductive themes and deductive findings found the theme “color and/or race does matter” was present in the relationships between and within all segments of Super’s (1990) model. The comparative analysis also revealed an expanded notion of self-concept for Black males – marginalized and/or oppressed individuals. Self-concepts, “such as self-efficacy, self-esteem, and role self-concepts, being combinations of traits ascribed to oneself” (Super, 1990, p. 202) do not completely address the self-concept of marginalized and/or oppressed individuals. The self-concept of marginalized and/or oppressed individuals is self-efficacy, self-esteem, traits ascribed to oneself expanded by their awareness of how others view them. (DuBois, 1995; Freire, 1970; Sheared, 1990; Super, 1990; Young, 1990). Ultimately, self-concept is utilized to make career and life decisions. Current human resource policies and practices do not take into consideration that negative police contact could be the result of racial profiling. Current human resource hiring guidelines penalize individuals who have had negative police contact. Therefore, racial profiling is a discriminatory act that can effectively circumvent U.S. Equal Employment Opportunities Commission laws and serve as a boundary mechanism to employment (Rocco & Gallagher, 2004).

With discussion of Indigenous laws on the rise in Canada, this thesis explores the question of law’s power: jurisdiction. In this project, I ask whether Indigenous jurisdiction is active in conflicts between Indigenous and state actors over the environment, in the context of the Heiltsuk Nation on the central coast of British Columbia. This project looks to critical legal theory for an understanding of jurisdiction. It identifies three aspects of jurisdiction that are discussed in critical legal theory and related fields: that it is technical, it is authoritative, and it is spatial. Adopting these qualities as provisional indicators of jurisdiction, it applies thefzm to three case studies of Heiltsuk (or “Haíɫzaqv”) conflicts with the state, which engage colonial law in different ways. The three case studies concern (1) herring harvest and management, which was litigated in R v Gladstone; (2) land use and forestry, which is the subject of the Great Bear Rainforest agreements; and (3) trophy hunting for bears, which is the subject of a grassroots campaign based on Indigenous law. Adopting a qualitative approach adapted from institutional ethnography, this project applies a critical jurisdictional lens to each case study, using documentary review and interviews to explore the technical, authoritative, and spatial aspects of each conflict. Ultimately, I find that expressions of Heiltsuk jurisdiction – as understood from a colonial, critical perspective – are already at play in each conflict, although this is not immediately visible from the point of view of colonial law. In the conclusion, I explore the different manifestations and strategies of Heiltsuk jurisdictional expressions, and the ways that colonial jurisdiction interacts with them. / Graduate / 2021-12-19

Les accords de libre-échange sont généralement étudiés indépendamment les uns des autres; ou, quand ils le sont conjointement, le détail des dispositions n'est pas présenté. L'objet ici est de fournir un tracé des différents accords de libre-échange entre le Canada et les États-Unis, aussi loin qu'il est possible de remonter. Nous couvrons: le traité de réciprocité de 1854; l'accord rejeté de 1911; les deux accords issus de la vision de Hull de 1935 et 1938; l'accord avorté de 1947; le Pacte de l'automobile de 1965; et les trois accords les plus récents, soit l'ALÉ, l'ALÉNA et l'ACÉUM. Le survol proposé est prépondéramment juridique. Il s'agit d'abord et avant tout de la comparaison des dispositions des différents accords. En outre, nous nous concentrons sur le commerce de biens, car c'est le seul fil conducteur qui permette des parallèles remontant jusqu'au XIX e siècle. Ensuite, cette analyse est baignée dans un contexte historique, dans la mesure où celui-ci aide à bien mieux cerner les enjeux soulevés par les dispositions spécifiques. Enfin, nous ajoutons à ce corps de l'étude des observations de nature économique. De ce fait, nous proposons une approche multidisciplinaire: le détail de la méthodologie suivie est exposé en détail. À présent, de manière plus précise, la problématique soulevée est la suivante: à l'étude de toutes les ententes commerciales entre le Canada et les États-Unis, quelle est la forme, l'approche, qui est la plus susceptible de faciliter efficacement le commerce entre les deux pays dans l'avenir? La conclusion est fort simple: les accords de libre-échange à spectre large—c'est-à-dire comprenant plusieurs secteurs producteurs de biens—ont en général été plus faillibles que les accords sectoriels, qui se concentrent sur des questions plus modestes, mais plus précises. En effet, les trois derniers accords de libre-échange entre le Canada et les États-Unis sont, derrière des apparences d'ententes englobantes, en dernière analyse, des amalgames d'accords sectoriels agencés dans une charpente à aspirations globales. C'est là la conclusion principale des présents efforts. Nous tirons en outre plusieurs points de synthèse, qui aident à illustrer les points fixes caractérisant les relations commerciales entre le Canada et les États-Unis au fil des décennies. / When free trade agreements are studied, they are usually considered independently of each other or, when they are examined jointly, the details of the provisions are not presented. The aim here is to provide an overview of the various free trade agreements between Canada and the United States, going as far back as is feasible. We do cover: the reciprocity treaty of 1854; the rejected agreement of 1911; the two agreements based on Hull's views of 1935 and 1938; the aborted agreement of 1947; the auto pact of 1965; and the three most recent agreements, FTA, NAFTA and the USMCA. The proposed survey is predominantly juridical in nature. It is first and foremost a comparison of the provisions of the various agreements. In particular, we focus on trade in goods, as this is the only thread that allows for parallels going back to the 19th century. Next, this analysis is framed in historical contexts, as these help us better understand the issues raised by the various provisions. Finally, economic comments are added to this core of the research. We thus propose a multidisciplinary perspective: the finer points of the followed methodology are set out in detail. Now, more specifically, the main question raised is spelled out as follows: after considering all of the trade agreements between Canada and the United States, what is the format, the approach, that is most likely to be the most effective in facilitating trade between the two countries in the future? The conclusion is quite simple: broad-spectrum free trade agreements—that is, agreements that cover several goods-producing sectors—have generally been more fallible than sectoral agreements, which focus on smaller, but more specific issues. Indeed, the last three free trade deals between Canada and the United States are, behind the appearances of all-encompassing agreements, essentially amalgamations of sectoral agreements arranged in a framework of global aspirations. This is the main conclusion of our research. We also make several other synthetical points, which illustrate some of the unwavering issues that have characterized the Canada-U.S. trade relationship over the years.

La fin de non-recevoir est un concept juridique qui se manifeste par la paralysie totale et définitive d’un droit d’action autrement disponible. Malgré des effets dévastateurs et une popularité toujours croissante, près de quarante ans après sa reconnaissance par la Cour suprême, ses contours demeurent flous et sa substance, incertaine. Juges et juristes ne s’entendent ni sur la définition, ni sur les conditions d’application de cette doctrine mal comprise et peu théorisée. Ce mémoire s’appuie sur une analyse historique et comparative de ses sources françaises, anglaises et québécoises et sur une analyse systématique des décisions qui y font appel afin de jeter les bases d’une théorie des fins de non-recevoir en droit privé québécois. Il retrace, au fil des bouleversements politiques et économiques qui ont marqué leur histoire, l’émergence des fins de non-recevoir comme mécanisme hybride unique, gardiennes de la cohérence du droit et outils de matérialisation de ses principes généraux. Il introduit une distinction indispensable entre fins de non-recevoir dirimantes et discrétionnaires et établit un cadre conceptuel inédit qui explique et justifie les différentes fins de non-recevoir qui peuvent s’élever – sanctions, remèdes ou mesures d’équité – et systématise les modes et conditions de leur application. Théoriser la fin de non-recevoir est essentiel pour dépasser les dilemmes du choc entre principes généraux et droit codifié, éviter que l’arbitraire n’étende son emprise au cœur de l’appareil judiciaire et clarifier le rôle des principes généraux dans l’actualisation d’une justice non seulement procédurale, mais aussi matérielle. / The fin de non-recevoir (bar to an action) is a legal concept that results in the total and definitive paralysis of an otherwise available right of action. Despite its devastating effects and growing popularity, nearly forty years after its recognition by the Supreme Court, its contours remain blurry and its substance, ambiguous. The legal community cannot agree on the definition or conditions of this poorly understood and under-theorized doctrine. This thesis builds on a comparative historical analysis of French, English, and Quebecois sources and a systematic review of recent cases to lay the groundwork for a theory of fins de non-recevoir in Quebec private law. Along the political and economic transformations that shaped their history, it traces the emergence of judicially created barriers to legal actions as a unique, hybrid mechanism in the midst of law, keeper of its coherence and enforcer of its guiding principles. This thesis further introduces a crucial distinction between absolute and discretionary bars and establishes a novel conceptual framework that explains and justifies the various bars that may be invoked—whether as sanctions, remedies, or balancing measures—and systematizes how and when they may apply. Theorizing unwritten bars to actions allows us to move beyond the paradoxical opposition between general principles and codified law. It prevents arbitrariness from taking hold of vital spaces in the judicial system. It clarifies the role of general principles of law in bringing about a substantive—not merely procedural—form of justice.

In 1807, Parliament passed an Act to abolish the slave trade, leading to the Royal Navy’s campaign of policing international waters and seizing ships suspected of illegal trading. As the Royal Navy captured slave ships as prizes of war and condemned enslaved Africans to Vice-Admiralty courts, formerly enslaved Africans became “captured negroes” or “liberated Africans,” making the subjects in the British colonies. This work, which takes a microhistorical approach to investigate the everyday experiences of liberated Africans in Tortola during the early nineteenth century, focuses on the violent conditions of liberated African women, demonstrating that abolition consisted of violent contradictions that mirrored slavery.

My thesis is an analysis of my own translation of a chapter from Dominik Nagl's legal history 'Grenzfälle,' which addresses questions of citizenship and nationality in the context of the German colonies in Africa and the South Pacific. My analysis focuses primarily on strategies that I used in an effort to preserve the strangeness of a linguistic context that is, in many ways, "foreign" to twenty first-century North Americans while also striving to avoid reproducing the violence embedded in language that is historically laden with extreme power disparities.

Today, some twelve million immigrants are unlawfully present in the United States. What response to this situation does Christian theology suggest for these immigrants and those who receive them? To this question about the status of immigrants before the law, the theological literature lacks an understanding of how federal U.S. immigration law developed, and it lacks a robust theological account of the governance of immigration. To fill this gap, the thesis presents three stages in the formation of the laws that designate some immigrants as aliens unlawfully present or illegal aliens, drawing out the moral argumentation in each phase and responding with moral theology. In the first stage, non-citizens were called aliens in U.S. law. In response to the argument that aliens exist as a consequence of natural law, Christian teaching indicates that immigrants are not alien either in creation or for the church. In the second stage, the authority of the federal government to exclude and expel aliens was established, leaving those who do not comply to be designated illegal aliens. To the claim that the federal government has unlimited sovereignty over immigration, interpretations of the Christian Scriptures respond that divine sovereignty limits and directs civil authority over immigration. In the third stage, legal reforms that were intended to end discrimination between countries allowed millions from countries neighboring the U.S. to become illegal aliens. These reforms turn out to be unjust on philosophical grounds and unneighborly on theological grounds. While federal law classes many as aliens unlawfully present in the United States, Christian political theology indicates that immigrants are not alien, the government of immigration is limited by divine judgment, and nationals of neighboring countries deserve special regard.

This thesis examines 'improvement' of wetland commons in early modern England as a contested process of rapid environmental change. As a flagship project of agrarian improvement, drainage sought to alchemise pastoral fen commons into arable enclosed terra firma and promised manifold benefits for crown, commoners, and commonwealth alike. In practice, however, improvement schemes generated friction between the political and fiscal agendas of governors and projectors and local communities' customary ways of knowing and using wetland commons, provoking the most sustained and violent agrarian unrest of the seventeenth century. This thesis situates the first state-led drainage project in England, in the northern fens of Hatfield Level, in the context of the local politics of custom, national legal and political developments, and international movements of capital, expertise, and refugees; all of which intersected to reshape perceptions and management of English wetlands. Drawing on the analytic perspectives of environmental history, this thesis explores divergent ideas and practices generating conflict over the making of private property, reorganisation of flow, and reconfiguration of lived environments. This thesis argues that different 'environing' practices - both mental and material - distinguished what was seen as an ordered or disordered landscape, determined when and how water was understood as a resource or risk, and demarcated different scales and forms of intervention. Rival visions of the fenscape, ways of knowing land and water, and concepts of value and justice were productive of, and produced by, different practices of management, ownership, and use. Drainage disputes therefore crossed different spheres of discourse and action, spanning parliament, courtroom, and commons to bring improvement into dialogue with fen custom and generate a contentious environmental politics. In seven substantive chapters, this thesis investigates how improvement was imagined, legitimised, and enacted; how fen communities experienced and navigated rapid environmental transformation; and how political, social, and spatial boundaries were reforged in the process. By grounding improvement in the early modern fenscape, this thesis reintegrates agency into accounts of inexorable socio-economic change, illuminates ideas at work in social contexts, and deepens understandings of environmental conflict.

This thesis evaluates and constructs a general, product-neutral legal concept and model of financial instruments, as opposed to the product-dependent definitions currently employed in contemporary capital markets law. Through a combination of law and economics perspectives, legal history, and comparative analysis, the study examines the various types of financial instruments currently and previously in use. The legal characteristics and features of these instruments are evaluated and compared, leading to the identification of commonalities that can be used to define a product-neutral concept. The thesis argues that such a concept is more beneficial to the function of the capital markets by removing obstacles for financial innovation while also providing a consistent way to ensure that new financial products are governed by the same regulatory framework as comparable instruments.The thesis also examines the historical evolution of financial instruments and how it has been driven by the evolution of international trade and the demand and surplus of available capital. The proposed concept is applied to current financial instruments, including equity and debt, as well as pre-modern markets, and evaluated in terms of regulation, practical use, and legal characteristics such as transferability and negotiability.The research of this thesis encountered several challenges and limitations. Firstly, the historical and comparative analysis proved difficult to carry out, due to limitation in available source material and language related restrictions, respectively. These limitations were overcome by limiting the scope and by employing contacts with law firms in the respective jurisdictions. Secondly, several key issues proved to require further research to be able to provide definitive conclusions. Such research would have been out of scope and as such, simplified explanations and models were employed. The thesis concludes with a discussion of the practical implications of the proposed concept, including its application to cryptocurrencies and similar assets, and identifies potential areas for future research.