Joanna Harrington is a Professor of Law and the holder of the Eldon Foote Chair in International Business and Law at the University of Alberta. She is also a part-time Commissioner with the Canadian Human Rights Commission and a member of the Government of Alberta's Victims of Crime and Public Safety Programs Committee. A law professor for 20+ years, her teaching and research activities focus on legal issues at the intersection of national and international law. She served for five years as an associate dean with campus-wide responsibilities for graduate studies; has held visiting appointments at the University of New South Wales, the University of Oxford, and the University of Texas at Austin; and served as a consultant with the United Nations Development Programme. She has also served as the academic-in-residence with the legal bureau of Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (now Global Affairs Canada), providing advice to government on matters of international law and representing Canada at the United Nations, the Organization of American States, and the Assembly of States Parties to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. An award-winning teacher and researcher, she received the Canadian Association of Law Teachers Prize for Academic Excellence in 2018.

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Recent Publications

Contribution to a new work in political science and international relations

Joanna Harrington, "Canada and International Law: Supporting a Rules-based Approach to International Relations" in Robert W Murray & Paul Gecelovsky, eds, The Palgrave Handbook of Canada in International Affairs (Berlin: Springer, 2021) at 251-271. DOI

This chapter focuses on Canada's efforts to foster the development of international law as an important ordering regime, while also recognizing that Canada's support for international institutions rarely translates to its own use of international courts for the settlement of inter-state disputes.

The publisher's website link can be found here, with the chapter found here.

Extradition, diplomatic assurances and human rights

Joanna Harrington, "Extradition, Assurances and Human Rights: Guidance from the Supreme Court of Canada in India v Badesha" (2019) 88 Supreme Court Law Review (2d) 273-293. Open access here.

This article evaluates a recent Supreme Court of Canada judgment concerning a legal challenge to the use of diplomatic assurances by sending states to alleviate substantial risks of serious mistreatment faced by an individual wanted for trial in another state. It is cited in RJ Currie & J Rikhof, International and Transnational Criminal Law, 3rd ed (Irwin Law, 2020) at 599.

Litigating international human rights and the protective potential of interim measures

Joanna Harrington, "The Legitimacy of Interim Measures from the Perspective of a State: The Example of Canada" in Eva Rieter & Karin Zwaan, eds, Urgency and Human Rights: The Protective Potential and Legitimacy of Interim Measures (The Hague: TMC Asser Press, 2021) at 115-134.

This chapter is part of a new book on the urgent need for widespread respect for interim measures in international human rights cases, calling for improvements from both states and the international human rights monitoring bodies, with state confidence to be fostered through greater transparency and rigour in reasons. The publisher's website link can be found here, with the chapter found here.

Assessing Canada's legislative scheme for tackling foreign corruption

Joanna Harrington, "Addressing the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials: Developments and Challenges within the Canadian Legal Landscape" (2018) 56 The Canadian Yearbook of International Law 98-143. DOI: 10.1017/cyl.2019.3

This article undertakes a scholarly review of the past 20 years of Canadian effort under the Corruption of Foreign Public Officials Act, identifying the need for more work to be done to improve the Act's effectiveness. It also identifies the need to more clearly define the victims of foreign corruption and discusses the need to secure the return of proceeds of crime through improved cooperation across multiple jurisdictions.

Providing assistance for the victims of foreign corruption

Joanna Harrington, “Providing for Victim Redress within the Legislative Scheme for Tackling Foreign Corruption” (2020) 43:1 Dalhousie Law Journal 245-280. Open access here.

This article examines the prospects for victim redress for the corporate commission of foreign corruption, using Canada as a case study and the SNC-Lavalin affair as the factual backdrop. Borrowing from creative sentencing in environmental law, the article proposes the creation of a fund to which the financial penalties for foreign corruption could be directed to support the provision of international development assistance to affected foreign countries.

A related piece for the CBA's National magazine can be found here. For an earlier piece for Policy Options magazine, see here.

New edition of the Public International Law title for Halsbury’s Laws of Canada

Established in 1907, "Halsbury’s" is the common law world’s best known first point of reference for legal practitioners. The first edition of a Canada-specific Halsbury's was launched in 2006 and completed in 2012. With 100+ subject titles written by academics, practitioners and judges, HLC aims to provide a clear exposition on every aspect of the current law of Canada. The series, and the 2019 edition of the Public International Law title, are available in print and online via LexisNexis Advance Quicklaw.

List of Publications