Are you a feminist who wants to reform laws and policies to advance women's rights?

Law reform is an essential component of the struggle for women’s equality in Canada. It is an opportunity to change laws and policies to better reflect the experiences, perspectives and realities of women in all their diversity.

The National Association of Women and the Law (NAWL) developed this open access course to equip law students and social justice advocates, activists and organizations with the skills and knowledge to engage in feminist law reform and advance equality rights. It draws on the expertise of feminist lawyers and others actively engaged in federal law reform to provide a tool-kit for pursuing systemic legislative remedies to advance this crucial work in Canada.

While this course is primarily geared towards training the next generation of feminist law reformers, we hope it will also be useful as a template and resource for educators designing courses on feminist law reform and advocacy.

Training the next generation of feminist law reformers.

Please note that the information provided through video clips captures the individual opinions and advice of some of Canada’s foremost experts on various aspects of the law reform process. None of the information offered in these mini-lectures, or other components of this online course, should be treated as legal advice.

All of NAWL’s videos have been closed-captioned on YouTube. To use this feature, click on the symbol marked “CC” in the options menu at the bottom of the video viewing window. There you will also be able to select the option of captions in French or English.

Course Modules

Module 1: Why Feminist Law Reform?

Module 2: What is Substantive Equality?

Module 3: The House of Commons & its Committees

Module 4: The Senate & its Committeess

Module 5: Interacting with MPs and Senators

Module 6: Engaging Ministers and Government Officials

Module 8: Social Media & Digital Advocacy

Module 9: The Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP) Process

Module 10: Gender-based Analysis Plus (GBA+) in the Law Reform Process

Module 11: Using United Nations Mechanisms

Module 12: Legal Frameworks for Feminist Advocacy

Module 14: Law Reform Advocacy in Action

Module 15: Issues and Resources for Feminist Law Reform in a time of COVID-19

Mini-Courses

Free

Provincial and Territorial Governments

This mini-course on Provincial & Territorial Governments is meant as a complement to NAWL’s core modules on Feminist Law Reform. NAWL is grateful to Amanda Therrien for her invaluable work as the primary author of this mini-course.

Free

Municipal Governments

This mini-course on Municipal Governments is meant as a complement to NAWL’s core modules on Feminist Law Reform. NAWL is grateful to Amanda Therrien for her invaluable work as the primary author of this mini-course.

Free

Women’s Rights & the Climate Crisis

This mini-course on Women’s Rights & the Climate Crisis is meant as a complement to NAWL’s core modules on Feminist Law Reform. NAWL is grateful to Rose Ghaedi for her invaluable work as the primary author of this mini-course.

Thank You

This online course was developed with the generous support of Shirley Greenberg, the National Association of Women and Law Charitable Trust for Research and Education and Status of Women Canada (now Women and Gender Equality Canada), and based on the original course developed by Julie Shugarman and Martha Jackman.