Laverne Jacobs, PhD
Full Professor
Laverne Jacobs is a Full Professor and legal scholar at the University of Windsor, Faculty of Law where she holds the Research Chair in Disability Equality & Administrative Justice. Professor Jacobs is an elected member of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the first Canadian to serve on this UN Human Rights Treaty Body.
Professor Jacobs teaches, researches and writes in the areas of disability rights law, administrative law, human rights law, and administrative justice. Her work sits at the intersection of disability equality law and administrative law and justice. Her scholarship is characterized by an interest in the everyday work of the administrative justice system and in the lived experiences of the people who use it, particularly persons with disabilities. As a legal scholar and author, she has published and presented extensively in her fields, both in Canada and internationally. Dr. Jacobs is the recipient of a number of awards including the Canadian Bar Association Touchstone Award (2021) and the Canadian Association of Law Teachers (CALT) Academic Excellence Award (2022).
Dr. Jacobs founded and directs The Law, Disability & Social Change Project, a research and public policy centre at Windsor Law that works to foster and develop inclusive communities. She is also Co-Director of the Disability Rights Working Group at Berkeley Law’s Center for Comparative Equality & Anti-Discrimination Law. Througout her career, Professor Jacobs has held public appointments on boards, committees and tribunals, including serving on the Board of Directors of the Income Security Advocacy Centre and of the Canadian Institute for the Administration of Justice. At the University, she was Associate Dean (Research & Graduate Studies) for the Faculty of Law between 2018-2021.
In June 2022, Professor Jacobs was elected to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The Committee monitors the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) by countries that have ratified it. UN CRPD Committee members are independent experts selected from countries around the globe. Dr. Jacobs is the first-ever Canadian to be elected to serve on the United Nations CRPD Committee, and her election is historic for that reason.
Select Publications
Laverne Jacobs, “Access to Administrative Justice as an Administrative Law Value: Designing an Inclusive and Accessible Administrative Justice System” (2024) 40 Windsor Yearbook of Access to Justice 158.
Laverne Jacobs, “The Canada Disability Benefit Act and Women with Disabilities: Pursuing Disability Equality and Reducing Administrative Violence” (2024) 61(2) Osgoode Hall Law Journal 547.
Laverne Jacobs and Harry Dhaliwal, “Disabled Pedestrians, Micromobility, and Furthering Disability Equality Law through Consultation: A Case Study of the Toronto E-Scooter Ban” (2024) 13(4) Laws 52.
Laverne Jacobs, “Access to Post-secondary Education in Canada for Students with Disabilities” (2023) International Journal of Discrimination and the Law.
Mark Bell and Laverne Jacobs, "Guest editors' introduction: Inclusive post-secondary education and persons with disabilities" (2023) 23 International Journal of Discrimination and the Law.
Laverne Jacobs and Sule Tomkinson, "Examining the Social Security Tribunal’s Navigator Service: Access to Administrative Justice for Marginalized Communities" (Research Report, 2022).
Laverne Jacobs, "Ward: A Missed Opportunity for the Supreme Court of Canada to Denounce Bullying of Children with Disabilities and to Promote Substantive Equality", (Oxford Human Rights Hub Blog, Nov. 26, 2021).
Books
Laverne Jacobs, Ruby Dhand, David Ireland, Richard Jochelson, Freya Kodar and Odelia Bay, Law and Disability in Canada: Cases and Materials (Lexis-Nexis, 2021).
Laverne Jacobs, Martin Anderson, Rachel Rohr, Tom Perry, The Annotated Accessible Canada Act (2021) - published open access on CanLII and on the Law, Disability & Social Change Project website.
Laverne Jacobs & Sasha Baglay, eds., The Nature of Inquisitorial Processes in Administrative Regimes: Global Perspectives (Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2013) 416pp.
Laverne A. Jacobs & Justice Anne L. Mactavish., eds., Dialogue Between Courts and Tribunals – Essays in Administrative Law and Justice (2001-2007) (Montreal: Les Éditions Thémis, 2008) 398pp. (Full-text available here)
Articles and Book Chapters
Laverne Jacobs, "The Universality of the Human Condition: Theorizing Transportation Inequality Claims by Persons with Disabilities in Canada 1976-2016" (2018) 7 Canadian Journal of Human Rights pp. 35-66.
Laverne Jacobs, "The Dynamics of Independence, Impartiality, and Bias in the Canadian Administrative State" in Administrative Law in Context, 3d edition, Colleen M. Flood & Lorne Sossin eds. (Toronto: Emond Montgomery, 2018).
Laverne Jacobs, "‘Humanizing’ Disability Law: Citizen Participation in the Development of Accessibility Regulations in Canada" (2016) Revue Internationale des Gouvernements Ouverts, pp. 93-120.
Laverne Jacobs, "The Accessibility for Manitobans Act: Ambitions and Achievements in Antidiscrimination and Citizen Participation," (2016) Canadian Journal of Disability Studies, Vol 5, No 4 , pp. 1-24 (with Britney DeCosta and Victoria Cino).
Laverne Jacobs, "From Rawls to Habermas: Toward A Theory of Grounded Impartiality in Canadian Administrative Law" (2014) 51(2) Osgoode Hall Law Journal 543-594.