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This article begins with a review of the first manifestations of the civilian institution of absence in Roman law and the French Napoleonic Code.  It then retraces the historical and conceptual origins of Quebec’s law of absence detailing its evolution from the Civil Code of Lower-Canada to the Civil Code of Quebec.

"Les personnes sont au coeur du droit. Les personnes physiques, tout d'abord. À la personnalité qui leur est reconnue s'attache un cortège de prérogatives garantes du respect de leur intégrité, de leur vie privée, de leur pensée... Nom, domicile, actes de l'état civil contribuent à donner force à l'impératif d'identification de la personne. Identifier, toutefois, ne suffit pas. Il faut aussi protéger, non seulement contre toute atteinte illicite à l'intégrité de la personne, mais aussi contre les faiblesses que peuvent induire l'âge, la maladie... Quant aux personnes morales, leur diversité est extrême. Leur poids dans la vie économique et sociale justifie un examen attentif des règles qui gouvernent leur constitution, leur fonctionnement, leur dissolution... Le tout est constamment éclairé par la présentation de documents : extraits de textes législatifs ou réglementaires, circulaires, décisions de justice, données statistiques, etc." --Cover page 4

This Article advances the comparative constitutional literature by examining the exercise of remedial discretion in rights litigation. It compares how the Supreme Court of Canada and the Constitutional Court of South Africa remedy unconstitutional legislation under their respective, relatively new, bills of rights. It uses an internal legal approach and, rejecting universalism and convergence, it pays attention to difference in constitutional texts. By reporting remedial practices and studying the written and unwritten factors that judges identify as conditioning their remedial determinations, the Article studies the significant gap between authoritative text and practice. In a warning for those who draft bills of rights, who rely on their texts to forecast judicial practice, or who simply aim to delineate and understand the exercise of judicial power under bills of rights, judges’ discussion reveals that the scope of action they perceive as legitimate may differ from what a rights instrument’s text implies. This gap has implications for efforts to classify forms of judicial review as strong-form or weak-form, as it may reduce the effective distance between different models as they appear on paper. The Article identifies shifting and contradictory views about reading-in versus invalidating legislation, and about immediate versus delayed orders. Based on its comparison of judicial remedial practices, the Article flags the unavoidable uncertainty of applying a bill of rights to legislation. It interprets the practices of the two countries’ highest courts as embodying a preference for a judicial posture of legislative engagement over one of constitutional enforcement. This conception of the judicial role emerges from similarities in practice, despite differences in the authorizing constitutional texts. The Article establishes a firm basis for normative evaluation of the legitimacy of judicial remedial discretion exercised with a view to engaging the democratic branches of government.

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This chapter is about the interpretation of section 1 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Section 1 allows ‘limits’ to constitutional rights insofar as they are reasonable and justified in a free and democratic society. It asks the state for moral justification when a right has been infringed by state action. Moral justification has formal and substantive aspects; therefore the application of section 1 deploys a formal framework of proportionality nestled within a thin conception of liberal democratic political morality. The chapter also addresses the relative moral importance of the notion of ‘rights’, as well as the relevance of institutional considerations. It concludes that the section 1 framework follows a standard model of moral justification and cannot be significantly improved upon.

This paper argues that there are distinct parallels between changes to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act enacted by Bill C-31 (2012), in particular the Designated Foreign National regime (DFN), and Australia’s treatment of asylum seekers who arrive by boat. It is contended that recent Australian history and policy demonstrate the perils of adopting an ideology of control and exclusion toward asylum seekers instead of a politics of hospitality, and that Australia’s present political climate provides a stark and salutary warning to Canada, as it follows a similar path of securitization. The paper first explains what is meant by a politics of hospitality. In Part I, it analyzes Australia’s attitude toward, and its treatment of, asylum seekers, focusing in particular on the period since 1989. It is argued that Australia’s inhospitable stance toward asylum seekers has had discernible negative outcomes that provide important lessons for Canada. Part II provides a brief historical overview of Canadian policy toward asylum seekers, followed by an analysis of the DFN regime with reference to international law. It then argues that the DFN provisions contravene the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The paper concludes by suggesting that Canada is at risk of following Australia’s security-oriented, inhospitable stance toward asylum seekers.

Adult refugee claimants experience several well-documented post-migratory challenges. Little is known about the resettlement process for refugee claimant families with children. This study reports on 75 open-ended, in-depth interviews with refugee claimant families in Montreal about their resettlement challenges and their proposed solutions to them. These interviews were conducted with 33 dyads and triads of children and parents attending a paediatric hospital. Experiences accessing formal and informal child care in Montreal were addressed. Subsequently, a comparative policy analysis was conducted on residency eligibility criteria for child care subsidization. Twenty-eight out of 39 parents (73%) report a lack of informal or formal child care and 15 out of 33 families (39%) propose improving access to formal child care services. They describe a lack of informal child care as a result of reduced social networks, and affordability as a barrier to formal child care services. Refugee claimants are not eligible for subsidized child care in Quebec. A comparative policy analysis within Canada and comparable countries reveals that this situation is not unique to Quebec. However, most provinces and European countries offer child care subsidies to refugee claimants. Refugee claimants should qualify for child care subsidies. Social workers and community organizations should consider their clients' child care needs in designing programmes and services.

Disclaimer: This summary was generated by AI based on the content of the source document.