This joint research initiative, a collaboration between the Institute of Comparative Law and the Hans & Tamar Oppenheimer Chair in Public International Law, examines the legal conceptualization of labour exploitation. Through an interdisciplinary, transnational and historical methodology, this project will draw on a variety of disciplines, spaces in time, and places around the world, to explore law’s understanding of “labour exploitation” and its relationship to society and practices.
This year, the series consists of three events:
- Joel Quirk, “The Fictive Coherence of Global Struggle: Combating ‘Modern-Day Slavery’ in Rhetoric and Practice” - Monday, September 28th (via video-conference)
- Jean-François Niort, “Legal Frameworks and Economic Practices Around Slave Labour in Colonial Society: The Case of the French West Indies (Guadeloupe-Martinique) in the 18th Century” - Wednesday, November 4, 2015
- Afua Cooper, "Aspects of the Triangular Slave Trade in Canada" - Wednesday, November 25, 2015 (via video-conference)
2014-2015
Four events took place in 2014-2015:
- Richard Cholewinski, "The Rights of Migrant Workers: An ILO Perspective"
- Kendra Strauss, Assistant Professor at the Labour Studies Program & The Morgan Centre for Labour Research - "Placing Unfree Labour"
- Adrian A Smith, Assistant Professor in Carleton University’s Department of Law and Legal Studies, cross-appointed to the Institute of Political Economy and the Institute of African Studies - "Historicizing ‘Food Labour’ and Law"
- Elizabeth Elbourne, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of History and Classical Studies, McGill University delivered a presentation titled "After abolition : British humanitarian colonialism, the Niger Expedition and the drive to remake African labour"
2013-2014
The 2013-2014 academic year focused on establishing a transdisciplinary lecture series on old and new forms of ‘slavery’. Two distinguished guests were invited to deliver lectures in our inaugural year.
- Annie Bunting, Deputy Director of the Harriet Tubman Institute for Research on Africa and its Diasporas, and Associate Professor of Law & Society at York University, who delivered a lecture titled: “Contemporary Slavery, Women’s Oral Histories, and the case of Conjugal Slavery in War”; and,
- Ariel Gross, John B and Alice R Sharp Professor of Law and History, University of Southern California, who delivered a lecture titled “All Born to Freedom? Comparing the Law and Politics of Race and the Memory of Slavery in the US and France Today”.
Both lectures were extremely well attended by faculty and students, both within the law faculty and other departments.
As of 2014-2015, the ICL was joined by the Tubman Institute at York University as an organizing partner on the research initiative.
This initiative is jointly headed by Professor Helge Dedek, Director of the Institute of Comparative Law, and Professor François Crépeau, holder of the Oppenheimer Chair, in partnership with Professor Annie Bunting, Deputy Director of the Tubman Institute.
