This event presents a paper that considers what scholars of comparative administrative law can learn from the Supreme Court of Canada’s adoption of a scholarly idea. The idea is that administrative decision-making should be understood as a 'culture of justification'. This idea is highly suggestive but also ambiguous, because of the different ways of understanding what the term 'justification' means and what this requires in practice. Accordingly, the paper examines the global discourse around this idea as well as the form it takes in Canada: that administrative decisions should be well-reasoned and responsive to the people affected by them, while at the same time demonstrating fidelity to legislative intent. The paper argues that this is best understood as a project of 'reconciliation' – of reconciling people to the law that applies to them, while at the same time reconciling the state to the legal subject’s point of view. Moreover, this is best understood as a 'shared project' – a project that is shared between administrative decision-makers and the Courts. As a shared project, reconciliation may require different resources in different contexts: in simple cases, the skills of administrative decision-makers; in complex cases, the perspective, protocols, and powers of the Courts. Finally, the paper describes how understanding justification as a shared project of reconciliation might be said to express respect for dignity as well as respect for democracy, and proposes, as an agenda for research, an inquiry into the other principles that a project of reconciliation might bring into view – and the practices of adjudication that might help to give effect to these principles, too.
Speaker:
James S. F. Wilson studies comparative administrative and constitutional law and legal and political theory. He is currently studying how courts and administrative decision-makers resolve conflicts about the use of public authority, and how the forms of reasoning they use while doing this can express respect for people’s dignity. James was educated at Harvard University (AB magna cum laude 2000) and the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law (JD 2009), where he was a co-editor-in-chief of the University of Toronto Faculty of Law Review. After graduating from law school, James completed his articles with the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General, Constitutional Law Branch, and practiced regulatory and business litigation in Toronto, where he appeared at all levels of court in Ontario as well as the Supreme Court of Canada. He is also called to the bar in New York. James returned to the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law as a recipient of the Nathan Strauss Q.C. Graduate Fellowship in Canadian Constitutional Law (LLM 2018) before continuing his graduate studies at NYU School of Law (JSD expected 2024). He also currently serves as the senior associate editor for the International Journal of Constitutional Law (I-CON). Before attending law school, Mr. Wilson worked in the book publishing and film industries, in New York, and as a speechwriter for the Rt. Hon. Paul Martin, prime minister of Canada.