Roundtable / Table Ronde: “A Space for Research on Children and Law – Espace de recherche sur l’enfance et le droit”
La table ronde Regards & Jeux est une occasion de présenter une recherche ayant un lien significatif avec les enfants ou le droit de la jeunesse et qui est effectuée par un(e) étudiant(e). À l’occasion de cette table ronde, chaque participant doit faire un bref résumé de son essai ainsi que présenter une réflexion quant à son essai. La présentation peut se faire en anglais ou en français.
To Look and to Play’s roundtable is an opportunity for students to present their research on intersections between children and the law. During this roundtable, each participant reflects on and summarizes their research. The presentation can either be done in English or in French.
Essais de Réflexion 2022-2023 Reflection Essays
Shona Moreau: The “Best Interest of the Child”, a Constitutional, Statutory, and Common Law Concept in South Africa
This paper examines the legal framework of the "Best Interest of the Child" principle in South Africa's new republic. Focusing on the Constitutional Court's rulings, the study aims to identify the sources influencing these decisions and assess the impact of embedding the principle in the Constitution. The research reveals that while South African courts draw from a range of sources—international guidelines, constitutional law, statutory law, and common law—they primarily rely on constitutional mandates for their judgments. The paper is structured into three parts: a historical overview of South Africa's constitution and its relationship with children's rights; an analysis of how South African courts have evolved in their application of the principle; and a reflection on the implications of constitutionalizing the Best Interest of the Child in the South African context.
Kasia Johnson: Considering the Child in Paths to Liability in the Private Law of Civil Wrongs
Kasia Johnson’s research project investigates the presence of the child in different paths to civil liability (e.g., negligence, vicarious liability, and non-delegable duties of care) in the context of the child protection system. In this essay, she reflects on what it means to conceptualize the unique needs and interests of children within the sphere of private law, as well as shifts in her own understanding of ‘the child’.
Joseph Ho: Delivery of On-Reserve Indigenous Child Welfare Services: A Case Study from British Columbia and Federal Legislation
This research paper examines the cooperative arrangements between the federal government, provincial governments, and Indigenous communities behind the delivery of on-reserve Indigenous child welfare services. It focuses on a specific case study from British Columbia to illustrate the complexity and opacity of these arrangements, posing challenges to users and creating obstacles for Canada’s reconciliation with Indigenous peoples. 
joseph_ho_reflective_essay.pdf
Vibhuti Dikshit: Reimagining the Laws on Surrogacy from a Rights-Based Perspective – Can Women and Children Ever Be More than Chattel?
Maria Rueda Martinez: Medical Aid in Dying (MAID) For Infants of Less than One Year of Age with a Terminal Illness That Causes Intractable Severe Distress: A Legal and Ethical Perspective in the Canadian Landscape. This paper assesses the extent to which it is ethically and legally permissible for parents to request Medical Aid in Dying (MAiD) for their infant of less than one-year-old when (a) they have a terminal illness that (b) is causing intractable distress that is not alleviated by standard palliative care. An overview of end-of-life decision-making in neonatology and of the Canadian law of consent to treatment for incapable minors is provided to showcase that expanding MAiD to these infants at the parents’ requests is not out of line with current medical practice and legal frameworks. An in-depth analysis of the judicial reasoning underlying the concepts of autonomy, dignity, sanctity of life and protection of the vulnerable is conducted to defend that the expansion of MAiD to the newborns is also surprisingly consistent MAiD jurisprudence. maria_rueda_martinez_reflective_essay.pdf
Anne-Laurence Guilmette: Ontario’s Appellate Courts Approach to Parental Alienation
Marie-Pierre Doucette: Du consentement aux soins du mineur de 14 ans et plus atteint de troubles de santé mentale et de l'impuissance des parents
Carla Arbelaez: Bringing Child Climate Migrants Out of the Shadows: The Power of Mutually Reinforcing International Human Rights Narratives
This paper assesses whether the 2018 Global Compact for Safe, Orderly, and Regular Migration sufficiently upholds the Convention of the Rights of the Child protections afforded to this migrant subgroup. Overall, the paper concludes that despite inadequacies within the explicit text of Global Compact, a holistic reading of international soft law and hard law would require that the Global Compact be interpreted to include expansive State commitments to child climate migrants. carla_arbelaez_reflective_essay.pdf
Nathan Leung: Criminalized Plastic: A Look Into Child Sex Dolls as Therapy
Criminalized Plastic: A Look into Child Sex Dolls as Therapy examines how child sex dolls can be used as preventative therapy for pedophiles and how this would fit in under the current Canadian criminal legislation for possession of child pornography. nathan_leung_reflective_essay.pdf
Clara McGaughey: Human Trafficking as a Legal Strategy for the Abuse of Young Gymnasts
Based on a real case that never went to trial, this paper examines the potential and risks of using human trafficking as a legal strategy when adjudicating the systemic abuse of young gymnasts. It discusses the pitfalls of current legal recourses for athlete abuse, breaks down international definitions of human trafficking, and looks at what it means to bring child survivors of abuse into a fraught cultural discourse. clara_mcgaughey_reflective_essay.pdf