Watershed or fragile patchwork? An evaluation of the Supreme Court's approach to section 15(1) of the Charter.

摘要

This thesis examines the decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada in which section 15(1) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is the basis of the case. Emphasis is placed on Law v. Canada , a recent decision that sets out what the Court considers to be the "proper approach" to the interpretation of the Charter's equality provision. To determine whether or not the Court is building an equality jurisprudence capable of addressing the systemic conditions of inequality experienced by women and other oppressed groups, the thesis assesses the analytical framework used by the Court in terms of whether it adopts a contextual, inequality-based and intersectional approach. It argues that the unanimous approach articulated in Law is a fragile patchwork of previous articulations. Although it contains elements of a contextual, inequality and intersectional analysis, this approach is likely to break down as the Court considers more complex cases of inequality. To this extent, the ameliorative potential of the approach, although it exists, is limited and uncertain.