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Law, Representation, and Political Activism: Community-based Practice and the Mobilization of Legal Resources*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2014

Byron Sheldrick
Affiliation:
Department of Law, Keele University

Abstract

Discussions of the relationship between law and political activism have tended to rely on a rigid and unrealistic distinction between legislative and judicial institutional structures. This has led to a failure to consider the structure of professional organizations and the impediments to political activism around legal issues created by the nature of legal expertise. It is argued that the creation of democratic organizational forms, such as those adopted by some community-based legal clinics, holds possibilities for the successful integration of law into the broader political strategies of social groups.

Résumé

Le débat au sujet de la relation entre le droit et le militantisme politique a le plus souvent reposé sur la distinction rigide et peu réaliste établie entre les institutions législative et judiciaire. Cette distinction a été cause de l'incapacité de tenir compte de la structure des organismes professionnels et des obstacles au militantisme politique que constituent les questions d'ordre légal, obstacles résultant de la nature même de l'expertise légale. Selon l'auteur, l'adoption de structures organisationnelles démocratiques, telles que celles adoptées par certaines cliniques juridiques communautaires, permettrait une intégration efficace du droit dans le cadre plus large de la stratégie politique des organismes à vocation sociale.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Law and Society Association 1995

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References

1. The completed study of Ontario community legal clinics will involve interviews conducted at 15 different clinics, covering a range of geographic regions and types of clinic.

2. See, for example, Mandel, Michael, The Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Legalization of Politics (Toronto: Wall and Thompson, 1989)Google Scholar; Hutchinson, Allan & Petter, Andrew, “Private Rights/Public Wrongs: The Liberal Lie of the Charter” (1988) 38 University of Toronto Law Journal 178CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hutchinson, Allan & Petter, Andrew, “Rights in Conflict: The Dilemma of Charter Legitimacy” (1989) 23 University of British Columbia Law Review 531Google Scholar; Fudge, Judy & Glasbeek, Harry, “The Politics of Rights, a Politics with Little Class” (1992) 1 Social and Legal Studies 45CrossRefGoogle Scholar. In the American context, see Tushnet, Mark, “An Essay on Rights” (1984) 62 Texas Law Review 1363Google Scholar; Freeman, Alan, “Anti-Discrimination Law, A Critical Review” in Kairys, David ed., The Politics of Law: A Progressive Critique (New York: Pantheon Books, 1982) 121Google Scholar.

3. See, for example, Herman, Didi, “Beyond the Rights Debate” (1993) 2 Social and Legal Studies 25CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Schneider, Elizabeth, “The Dialectic of Rights and Politics: Perspectives from the Women's Movement” (1986) 61 New York University Law Review 589Google Scholar; McCann, Michael, “Legal Mobilization and Social Reform Movements: Notes on Theory and its Applications” (1991) 11 Studies in Law, Politics and Society 225Google Scholar; Bartholomew, Amy & Hunt, Alan, “What's Wrong with Rights” (1990) 9 Law and Inequality 1Google Scholar.

4. Herman, ibid. at 32.

5. Fudge & Glasbeek, supra note 2 at 58–59.

6. Hutchinson & Petter, “Private Rights/Public Wrongs”, supra note 2 at 295–97.

7. For a classic historical discussion of the contradictory relationship between law and politics, see Thompson, E. P., Whigs and Hunters: The Origins of the Black Act (London: Allan Lane, 1975)Google Scholar. See also Thompson, Noel, The People's Science, The Popular Political Economy of Exploitation and Crisis, 18161834 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984)Google Scholar for a discussion of how early workers' campaigns for democratic rights were combined with a sophisticated critique of capitalism and a radical political agenda.

8. Michael Mandel, for example, acknowledges that legislatures are not as democratic as one might like, but argues that we must “put these concerns aside” as legislatures still provide a more “honest” form of politics than courts since legislators are elected. See Mandel, supra note 2 at 38. For a discussion of the limitations of the British parliamentary system and the obstacles they present for progressive social transformation see Benn, Tony, “Obstacles to Reform in Britain” in Miliband, Ralph, Panitch, Leo, & Saville, John, eds., Socialist Register 1989 (London: Merlin Books, 1989) 130Google Scholar. In the Canadian context, see also Jackman, Martha, “Constitutional Rhetoric and Social Justice: Reflections on the Justiciability Debate” in Bakan, Joel & Schneiderman, David, Social Justice and the Constitution, Perspectives on a Social Union For Canada (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1992) 17 at 2425Google Scholar.

9. Allan Hutchinson, for example, has argued that the main purpose of the court is to sustain the illusionary distinction between the public and private spheres. For Hutchinson, if social movements ignore courts, with the consequent breakdown of the public-private dichotomy, courts would be left with a very limited range of truly legal tasks. See Hutchinson, Allan, “Mice Under a Chair: Democracy, Courts and the Administrative State” (1989) 23 University of Toronto Law Review 531Google Scholar.

10. Fudge & Glasbeek, supra note 2, for example, largely base their conclusions regarding the negative implications of rights politics on a consideration of the outcomes in a fairly selective number of cases. For a criticism of their choices and this methodology, see Herman, supra note 3 at 27–28 and 30.

11. See, for example, Mandel, supra, note 2 at 51–59. For a discussion of this from a post-modern perspective, see Smart, Carol, Feminism and the Power of Law (New York: Routledge, 1989)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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13. See Galipeau, Claude, “Political Parties, Interest Groups, and New Social Movements: Toward a New Representation?” in Gagnon, A. G. & Tanguay, A. B., eds., Canadian Parties in Transition (Toronto: Nelson, 1989) 404Google Scholar.

14. For an example of a social movement attempting to develop strategic and tactical resources for dealing with the state, see Maynes, Clifford, Public Consultation: A Citizens Handbook (Toronto: Ontario Environment Network, 1989)Google Scholar. For a discussion of the contradictions involved in engaging in politics on the terrain of the administrative state, see Watson, Sophie, ed., Playing the State: Australian Feminist Interventions (London: Verso, 1990)Google Scholar.

15. Offe, Claus, “Theses on the Welfare State” and “Social Policy and the Theory of the State” in Offe, Claus, ed., Contradictions of the Welfare State (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1984) 119, 88Google Scholar. For a discussion of how these contradictions have changed the structure of the Canadian state, see Boyle, Chris, “The ‘Irrationality’ of the State: The Nielson Report as a Challenge to Left Analysis” (1988) 27 Studies in Political Economy 53CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16. See N. Poulantzas, supra note 12 at 91.

17. Of course, I am not considering in this discussion the application of the criminal law where courts play a much larger role. Even here, however, the most visible manifestation of the force of law is often the highly coercive power of the police officer who enjoys considerable discretion.

18. In addition to the citations found, supra note 3, see also Hunt, Alan, “Rights and Social Movements: Counter-Hegemonic Strategies” (1990) 17 Journal of Law and Society 309CrossRefGoogle Scholar; McCann, Michael & Silverstein, Helena, “Social Movements and the American State: Legal Mobilization as a Strategy for Democratization” in Albo, Greg, Langille, David & Panitch, Leo, eds., A Different Kind of State? Popular Power and Democratic Administration (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1993) 131Google Scholar; Scheingold, Stuart, “Constitutional Rights and Social Change: Civil Rights in Perspective” in McCann, Michael & Houseman, Gerald, eds., Judging the Constitution, Critical Essays on Judicial Law-Making (Glenview: Scott, Foresman, 1989) 73Google Scholar; Brickey, Stephen & Comack, Elizabeth, “The Rule of Law in Social Transformation: Is a Jurisprudence of Insurgency Possible?” (1987) 2 Canadian Journal of Law and Society 97CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Handler, Joel, Social Movements and the Legal System, A Theory of Law Reform and Social Change (New York: Academic Press, 1978)Google Scholar.

19. McCann, supra note 3 at 228.

20. See, in particular, Bartholomew & Hunt, supra note 3.

21. McCann, supra note 3 at 229–30.

22. Ibid.

23. Bartholomew & Hunt, supra note 3 at 13.

24. This characterization is articulated in Fudge & Glasbeek, supra note 2 at 46–48.

25. For interesting comments on how the new public interest law is sceptical of bureaucracy and state interventions, see Trubek, Louise, “Critical Lawyering: Toward a New Public Interest Practice” (1991) 1 Boston University Public Interest Law Journal 49 at 52Google Scholar. This perspective may be contrasted with that of Alan Hutchinson and Andrew Petter who argue that the danger of rights discourse rests in its opposition to the state and its portrayal of the state as an enemy from which protection is needed. This, they argue, obscures the state's historic role as ally and protector of the disadvantaged, as witnessed by social welfare interventions. See Hutchinson & Petter, “The Liberal Lie of the Charter”, supra note 2. See, also, Petter, Andrew, “The Politics of the Charter” (1986) 3 Supreme Court Law Review 472Google Scholar.

26. A number of other scholars also emphasize the indirect benefits of a litigation strategy. See, for example, Schneider, supra note 3; Scheingold, supra note 18; Bartholomew & Hunt, supra note 3.

27. Generally, Canadian courts have a fairly limited remedial capacity. This reflects the dominant liberal philosophy which conceptualizes rights as a negative limit on government rather than creating positive obligations. See, for example, the decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in Schacter v. R. (1992), 93 D.L.R.(4th) 1 (S.C.C.).

28. Hunt, supra note 18 at 324.

29. In part, the optimistic approach many pro-rights advocates display towards the legal profession may stem from their own histories as activist lawyers. See, for example, Schneider, supra note 3. See, also some of the “minority positions” within the Critical Legal Studies movement described by Hunt & Bartholomew, supra note 3 at 34–49.

30. On the distinction between new- and old-style social movements, see, for example, Offe, Claus, “Challenging the Boundaries of the Political” (1985) 52 Social Research 817Google Scholar. More recently, the “newness” of the new social movements has been challenged. See Weir, Lorna, “Limitations of New Social Movement Analysis” (1993) 40 Studies in Political Economy 73CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Plotke, David, “What's So New about the New Social Movements” (1990) 20 Socialist Review 81Google Scholar. For an example of how new social movement analysis operates to “decentre” the state as the focus for political action, see Magnusson, Warren & Walker, Rob, “Decentring the State” (1988) 26 Studies in Political Economy 37CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

31. Neil Milner, for example, has argued that the Mental Patient Liberation movement has experienced its greatest success with rights-based strategies where litigation has been directed towards the advancement of claims to autonomy. See Milner, Neil, “The Dilemmas of Legal Mobilization: Ideologies and Strategies of Mental Patient Liberation Groups” (1988) 8 Law and Policy 115Google Scholar.

32. Plotke, supra note 30. I am not arguing that social movements should exclusively focus on the state as the objective of their political efforts. Rather, political struggle must take place on the terrain of both state and civil society. See also Poulantzas, supra note 12, especially part 5.

33. Weir, supra note 30.

34. The failure of advocates of a politics of rights to consider the organization problems inherent in legal mobilization is ironic given their reliance on the work of Antonio Gramsci. Pro-rights advocates borrow Gramsci's conception of counterhegemony and his focus on the contradictory nature of ideology, without considering his insights into questions of political organization. For Gramsci, a counter-hegemonic movement would require a particular organizational form which would foster the development of organic intellectuals and which would permit people to transcend the limits of “common sense” to an understanding of their trans-historical mission. The organizational form which Gramsci emphasized was, of course, the Modem Prince or mass party. New social movement and politics of rights advocates have dismissed Gramsci's focus on the mass party as a fragment of his “class determinism” without seriously considering the implications of his message regarding organization and how this might be applied to struggle on the terrain of law. See, for example, Hunt, supra note 18 at 312. See also LaClau, Ernesto & Mouffe, Chantal, Hegemony and Socialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics (London: Verso, 1985)Google Scholar.

35. See Cassels, Jamie & Maloney, Maureen, “Critical Legal Education: Paralysis with a Purpose” (1990) 4 Canadian Journal of Law and Society 99CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

36. See, for example, Robert Granfield's discussion of how law students redefine concepts of social justice and political involvement in such a way that is consistent with an acceptance of large-firm life and the occasional pro-bono case rather than more participatory forms of community involvement and social activism. Granfield, Robert, Making Elite Lawyers: Visions of Law at Harvard and Beyond (New York: Routledge, 1992)Google Scholar. See, also, Sherene Razack on the ideological perspectives and orientations of the founding members of the Women's Legal Education and Action Fund. Despite their radicalism, these lawyers tended to display a fundamental acceptance and belief in the existing political system. Razack, Sherene, Canadian Feminism and the Law: The Women's Legal Education and Action Fund and the Pursuit of Equality (Toronto: Second Story Press, 1991) at 35Google Scholar. See, also, Johnson, Lois, “The New Public Interest Law: From Old Theories to a New Agenda” (1991) 1 Boston University Public Interest Law Journal 173Google Scholar.

37. See, for example, Larson, Magali Sarfatti, “The Changing Functions of Lawyers in the Liberal State: Reflections for Comparative Analysis” in Abel, Richard & Lewis, Philip, eds., Lawyers in Society, Comparative Theories (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989) 427Google Scholar.

38. On the role of professions in monopolizing expertise and knowledge as a market strategy, see Larson, Magali, The Rise of Professionalism: A Sociological Analysis (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977)Google Scholar.

39. It is typical, for example, to view lawyers who work at legal aid clinics as somehow inferior to private bar lawyers. See, for example, the negative view of the Legal Aid Committee on the quality of service that could be provided through “storefront” clinical services. Legal Aid Committee, Report on Community Legal Services (Toronto: Law Society of Upper Canada, 1972) at 8, 81Google Scholar. See, also, The Law Society of Upper Canada, Benchers Bulletin, October 1991, vol 1, no. 2Google Scholar in which opposition is voiced to any system that would replace legal aid services provided by private bar lawyers with an expanded clinic system of staff lawyers. This opposition was based on the argument that clinics undermined the freedom to choose independent counsel, with a consequent deterioration of service.

40. See, for example, Bellow, Gary & Kettleson, Jeanne, “From Ethics to Politics: Confronting Scarcity and Fairness in Public Interest Practice” (1978) 58 Boston University Law Review 337Google Scholar. Bellow and Kettleson argue that the standards of practice followed within a legal clinic context should be the same as those of the private bar. For a critique of this position, see Tremblay, Paul R., “Toward a Community-Based Ethic for Legal Services Practice” (1990) 37 UCLA Law Review 1101Google Scholar. See, also, Buchanan, Ruth & Trubek, Louise G., “Resistances and Possibilities: A Critical and Practical Look at Public Interest Lawyering” (1992) 19 New York University Review of Law and Social Change 687 at 690Google Scholar. Buchanan and Trubek argue that there is no single model of the traditional public interest lawyer as “professional.” Rather, public interest practice has been characterized by a tension between a number of competing and conflicting ideals. One tension has been between the “need” to maintain professional independence from the client and a more politicized conception of lawyer as partisan.

41. Michael Mandel, supra note 2, for example, tends to portray lawyers as involved in a conspiracy to perpetrate a hoax on Canadians.

42. See, for example, Solomon, Rayman L., “Five Crises or One: The Concept of Legal Professionalism, 1925–1960” in Trubek, David, Nelson, Robert & Solomon, Rayman, eds., Lawyers' Ideals/Lawyers' Practices: Transformations in the American Legal Profession (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1992) 146Google Scholar. See, also, in the same volume Robert Nelson & David Trubek, “Arenas of Professionalism: The Professional Ideologies of Lawyers in Context” 177; and Robert Nelson & Daniel Trubek, “New Problems and New Paradigms in Studies of the Legal Profession” 2.

43. See, for example, Heinz, John & Laumann, Edward, Chicago Lawyers: The Social Structure of the Bar (New York & Chicago: Russell Sage Foundation & American Bar Foundation, 1982)Google Scholar. For a discussion of the growing trend towards large law firms in Canada, see Stager, David A. A. & Arthurs, Harry, Lawyers in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990)Google Scholar. For a discussion of the debate over professionalism versus commercialism in the United States, see Robert Nelson & David Trubek, “New Problems and New Paradigms in the Studies of the Legal Profession”, in Trubek, Nelson & Solomon, ibid.

44. Nelson & Trubek, “Arenas of Professionalism” in Trubek, Nelson & Solomon, ibid.

45. Mather, Lynn & Yngvesson, Barbara, “Language, Audience and the Transformation of Disputes” (1980) 15 Law and Society 775CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Mather and Yngvesson's work deals with a wide range of dispute types and does not focus exclusively on litigation.

46. See, for example, Michael McCann's discussion of the pay equity movement in the United States, supra note 3 and Neil Milner's discussion of the mental health liberation movement, supra note 31. See also Didi Herman's discussion of the gay and lesbian rights movement's experience with litigation, supra note 3.

47. See, for example, Antonyshyn, Patricia, Lee, B., & Merrill, Alex, “Marching for Women's Lives: The Campaign for Free Standing Abortion Clinics in Ontario” in Cunningham, Frank et al. , eds., Social Movements/Social Change: the Politics and Practice of Organizing (Toronto: Between the Lines, 1988) 129Google Scholar. See also Gavigan, Shelly, “Morgentaler and Beyond: Abortion, Reproduction and the Courts” in Brodie, Janine, Gavigan, Shelly & Jenson, Jane, The Politics of Abortion (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1992) 117Google Scholar for a discussion of how the pro-choice movement's understanding of rights changed during the post-Morgentaler period. Gavigan also provides a revealing account of how the anti-abortion movement continues to define the issue of abortion and the argument about foetal rights in terms that are not judicially endorsed.

48. Mather & Yngvesson, supra note 45 at 810.

49. There has been a renewed interest in the radical potential of democratization strategies in a number of different areas. On the importance of democratizing public administration, see Albo, Langille & Panitch, eds., supra note 18. Within the field of law there has been a growing interest in the concept of “critical lawyering.” See, for example, Buchanan & Trubek, supra note 40; Johnson, supra note 36; Trubek, supra note 25.

50. On the importance of new forms of knowledge and their relationship to expertise and professionalism, see Hilary Wainwright, “A New Kind of Knowledge for a New Kind of State” in Albo, Langille & Panitch, ibid. at 112.

51. Many clinics, for example, have been involved in the formation of tenants' organizations, battered womens' shelters, anti-poverty groups, etc.

52. For a discussion of the relationship between the spatial growth of the welfare state and the establishment of legal aid clinics, see Chouinard, Vera, “State Formation and the Politics of Place, The Case of Community Legal Aid Clinics” (1990) 9 Political Geography Quarterly 22CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

53. See, for example, Piven, Frances Fox & Cloward, Richard A., Poor People's Movements: Why they Succeed, How they Fail (New York: Vintage Books, 1979)Google Scholar.

54. See Offe, supra note 15.

55. For a vivid description of a highly bureaucratized neighbourhood legal service, see Alfieri, Anthony V., “Reconstructive Poverty Law Practice: Learning the Lessons of Client Narrative” (1991) 11 Yale Law Journal 2107CrossRefGoogle Scholar. More generally, on the relationship between legal services for the poor and bureaucratization, see Abel, Richard L., “Law Without Politics: Legal Aid Under Advanced Capitalism” (1985) 32 U.C.L.A. Law Review 474Google Scholar.

56. It is difficult to make broad generalizations about community legal clinics in Ontario. Each clinic enjoys a fair degree of autonomy. Consequently, there is a large variety of institutional forms and approaches to the legal service. This diversity, however, has made the clinics ideal sites for experimentation and allowed for the challenging of traditional definitions of legal professionalism.

57. This commitment to community is reflected in a document dealing with lobby strategies that was prepared for the clinics' Steering Committee on Social Assistance Reform. The document emphasizes the need to go beyond elite-based negotiations and build community support for a lobby campaign. See Broad, Gayle, Lobbying, A Strategy for Law Reform (30 July 1992) [unpublished]Google Scholar. Toronto-based clinics also sponsored a community development workshop in May 1992 in which participants from a number of social groups were invited to educate clinic workers about organizing strategies.

58. See “Metro Activists Declare War on Welfare System Cutbacks” The Toronto Star (27 March 1993) A3Google Scholar. This more oppositional strategy resulted in two rallies held over the summer of 1993 and an intensified lobbying campaign directed toward the provincial government, bureaucrats and M.P.P.s.

59. The person chosen for this job, a single mother on social assistance, had a long history of activism around social assistance issues.

60. See Coalition for Social Assistance Reform, Platform (Toronto, March 1993) [unpublished].

61. For a discussion of the procedural emphasis of many law reform programmes, see McCann, Michael, Taking Reform Seriously: Perspectives on Public Interest Liberalism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986)Google Scholar.

62. See, for example, the literature in the United States which has attempted to import into the structure of neighbourhood legal services traditional notions of “legal practice.” See Bellow & Kettleson, supra note 40.

63. See Blazer, Michael, “The Community Legal Clinic Movement in Ontario: Practice and Theory, Means and Ends” (1991) 7 Journal of Law and Social Policy 49 at 5354Google Scholar. Of course, clinics now rely on both the Law Society and the state for funding. This reliance introduces some pressure to conform to more traditional definitions of legal practice. See Blazer, ibid. at 63ff.

64. Grange, S. G. M., Report on Clinical Funding (Toronto: Attorney General of Ontario, 1978)Google Scholar Funding is administered by the Law Society through the Clinic Funding Committee and its staff.

65. Interview with Ted Strange, who worked at a number of the early clinics, including IWC, as a community legal worker. He subsequently became a lawyer and now works at East Toronto Community Legal Services.

66. See, for example. Law Society of Upper Canada, Workshop on Legal Aid (Toronto: L.S.U.C., 19831984) at D10Google Scholar for a description of the limited role of Clinic Funding in the creation of new clinics. See, also, Ron Ellis, “Create Your Own Legal Clinic” 2 Parkdale Community Legal Services Newsletter at 4, reproduced in Bovard, Joseph & Allen, Joan, The Impact of Parkdale Community Legal Services on the Parkdale Community: An Empirical Study (North York: Osgoode Hall Law School, 1976)Google Scholar.

67. For example, two clinics in Northern Ontario, Kinnaweya Legal Services in Thunder Bay and Keyatinok Legal Services in Moosonee, have boards of directors made up exclusively from members of local First Nations. This has given the clinics a legitimacy within the native communities that some other northern clinics do not have.

68. There have been very few studies of community legal workers and their role in the clinic system. For a very early study of community legal workers at the Parkdale Legal Clinic, see McGovern, Katie & Zemans, Fred, Community Legal Workers at Parkdale Community Services (Toronto: Osgoode Hall Law School, 1977)Google Scholar. For a more recent assessment of the role of Community Legal Workers, see the CLW Consultation Committee, The Community Legal Worker in the Clinic System (Toronto, 1991) [unpublished]Google Scholar.

69. This caused the University of Ottawa student's clinic considerable difficulty when it decided to stop representing men accused of spousal abuse. The main opposition to this move, interestingly, came from criminal lawyers in the Ottawa area who argued that the students were violating fundamental principles of advocacy in that they were allowing politics to interfere with their representation of individuals on a disinterested and equal basis. For a discussion of the controversy at the University of Ottawa clinic, see Carey, Ruth, “Useless’ (UOSLAS) v. The Bar: The Struggle of the Ottawa Student Clinic to Represent Battered Women” (1992) 8 Journal of Law and Social Policy 54Google Scholar.

70. ARCH, the Advocacy Resource Centre for the Handicapped has been particularly active in test-case litigation around s. 15 of the Charter. Other specialty clinics include the Metro Tenants Legal Services, Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto, the Canadian Environmental Law Association, the Advocacy Centre for the Elderly, Community Legal Education Ontario, the Centre for Spanish Speaking Peoples, the Industrial Accident Victims Group of Ontario, Injured Workers Consultants, Justice for Children and Youth, Pay Equity Advocacy Legal Services and the Metro Toronto Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic.

71. See Finkler, Lilith, “Community Organizing in the Clinic System” (1992) 3:2MTALK, The Newsletter of the Metropolitan Toronto Association of Legal Clinics 1Google Scholar.

72. See McGovern & Zemans, supra note 68. See also Robinson, Leslie, “Keeping the Community in Community Legal Work” (October 1987) Equity: The Poverty Law Reporter 8Google Scholar.

73. See also the report of the CLW Consultation Committee, supra note 68.

74. A comprehensive review of the legal aid system is currently underway in Ontario. The Law Society of Upper Canada, in its submission to the government, reiterated its commitment to a market model of legal aid, in which clients receive certificates or vouchers which permit them to obtain services from private bar lawyers. The Law Society, strongly resisted the notion of expanding the number of clinics, arguing without evidence, that clinics provide poorer legal service than the private bar and cause a diminution of the legal talent pool. See Law Society of Upper Canada, Legal Aid on Trial (Toronto: LSUC, 1992)Google Scholar. The hostility of the bar towards clinical models of practice is also reflected in the negative comments of Clayton Ruby, a bencher and prominent member of the criminal bar, regarding a proposal for the establishment of a “Women's Clinic.” See Ruby, Clayton, “Women Deserve Better” The Toronto Star (6 April 1994) A21Google Scholar.

75. See, in particular, supra note 39 at 73.

76. Ibid. at 84–86, 90–94.

77. Ibid. at 90. See also Mr.Osier, Justice John H., Report of the Ontario Task Forc on Legal Aid (Toronto: Attorney General of Ontario, 1974) at 55Google Scholar.

78. Osier, ibid. at 53.

79. In theory, clinic boards of directors still retain exclusive authority to make policy decisions relating to the operation of the clinic. Nevertheless, Clinic Funding has established a number of funding guidelines which apply to all clinics. These guidelines provide a broad scope for the potential control of clinic activities.

80. See, for example, the discussion of the defunding of People and the Law in Grange, supra note 64 at 6–7, 16. See also “Legal Aid Cuts Financial Help for Law Clinic” The [Toronto] Globe and Mail (16 February 1978) 3Google Scholar. People and the Law was defunded because it had changed its direction from the training of paralegals for other organizations to the utilization of law to aid the collective struggles of social groups.

81. See Blazer, supra note 63 at 66. Blazer overstates the degree to which the imposition of homogeneity by clinic funding has been successful. Many clinics actively resisted the lawyer-executive director model, and a number of clinics have maintained fairly decentralized organizational structures despite an outward appearance of hierarchy.

82. For a discussion of one clinic's experience with moving from a hierarchical model of organization to a system based on a co-directorship, where one director was a lawyer and the other a community legal worker, see Algoma Community Legal Clinic, Evaluation of the Co-Directorship Management System at the Algoma Community Legal Clinic (16 October 1991) [unpublished]Google Scholar.

83. See CLW Consultation Committee, supra note 68 at 27.

84. For a discussion of the constraints that operate to support the coherence of the profession, see Bourdieu, Pierre, “The Force of Law: Toward a Sociology of the Juridical Field” (1987) 38 Hastings Law Journal 805Google Scholar. The limits of attempting to redefine professional attitudes along more democratic lines without addressing institutional structures can be seen in the failure of the “new public administration” movement to substantially change bureaucratic practices in the United States. See Langton, Stuart, “The Evolution of Federal Citizen Involvement Policy” (1981) 1 Policy Studies Review 369CrossRefGoogle Scholar.