TODAY! TJ Centre Speakers Series and the Public Humanities at Western present: Efrat Arbel, UBC Law “Rethinking the Discourse of Crisis in Aboriginal Corrections” Monday, November 3 from 12:30-1:30 p.m. Western University in SSC 9420 Please join us! law.ubc.ca/faculty-staff/efrat-arbel Abstract: Canadian courts and legislatures have long recognized that Aboriginal peoples are vastly overrepresented in Canadian prisons. Perhaps most significantly, in its 1999 decision in R v Gladue, the Supreme Court of Canada famously remarked that the overincarceration of Aboriginal peoples represents a “crisis” in the criminal justice system reflecting entrenched societal inequalities and systemic biases, and outlined a legal framework through which this crisis should be addressed. Over a decade later, the Court reiterated this same claim in R v Ipeelee, again noting that Aboriginal overrepresentation represents a “crisis” in the Canadian criminal justice system, and again emphasizing the urgent need to address this problem. Despite this clear direction from the Court, Aboriginal people continue to be vastly overrepresented in Canadian prisons. In the last decade alone, for example, the rate of incarceration for Aboriginal women in federal prisons has increased by over 84%. Addressing the persistence of crisis in Aboriginal corrections, this paper asks: why despite repeated Supreme Court declarations that Aboriginal overincarceration is a “crisis” does the crisis persist, and even grow? And why, despite many earnest and well-meaning efforts to address the “crisis” over the span of so many years have these efforts not yielded meaningful change? Examining the broader effects of deploying a discourse of “crisis” in Aboriginal corrections, the paper posits that the question of why this problem persists is best addressed by paying attention to how it is conceptualized. It suggests that while the discourse of “crisis” accurately captures the severity and urgency of Aboriginal overincarceration, it is ultimately ill suited to address the problem at hand. Advocating a shift away from this discursive frame, the paper unpacks the discourse of “crisis” and the defensive anxieties it both reveals and obscures. Biography: Efrat Arbel is Assistant Professor at the UBC Faculty of Law. She earned her doctorate from Harvard Law School in 2012, where she worked under the supervision of Dean Martha Minow. She holds a BA from McGill University, a JD from UBC, and completed her LLM studies at Harvard Law School before proceeding with her doctorate. Dr. Arbel was selected for numerous fellowships and awards throughout her graduate studies, and held a Canada Research Fellowship with Harvard’s Weatherhead Center for International Affairs from 2008-2011. She has also held positions as a teaching and research fellow at Harvard Law School; as a research fellow at the Kennedy School of Government; and as a researcher with the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Law Clinic. Before pursuing graduate studies, Dr. Arbel clerked at the British Columbia Supreme Court and worked in the Vancouver office of a national firm. Prior to joining the faculty at UBC, Dr. Arbel was awarded a two-year postdoctoral fellowship by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, ranking in the top tier of candidates to receive this award. She completed her postdoctoral tenure at UBC Law between 2012-2014. During that time, she also held visiting appointments at the Oxford University Centre for Criminology and the European University Institute. Dr. Arbel researchers in the areas of constitutional law, refugee law, Aboriginal law, and prison law, in Canada and the United States. She has published widely in these fields. Combining her scholarly work with legal practice, Dr. Arbel is also engaged in advocacy and litigation involving refugee and prisoner rights. She has served on sub-committees with Westcoast LEAF, and is an executive member of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers. Dr. Arbel teaches torts and constitutional law and supervises JD and graduate student research.
Posted on: Mon, 03 Nov 2014 15:20:43 +0000
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