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Faculty of Law

Jeremy Webber

Jeremy Webber

Professor Emeritus

Contact:
Office: FRA 222
ORCID:
ORCID 0000-0003-2825-382X
Credentials:
BA (UBC), LLB and BCL (McGill), LLM (Osgoode Hall).
Area of expertise:
Legal theory, constitutional theory, Indigenous rights, federalism, cultural diversity, and constitutional law

Biography

Jeremy Webber is Professor Emeritus of Law at the University of Victoria (Canada) and Professorial Fellow at the University of Melbourne. He has written widely in legal theory, constitutional theory, Indigenous rights, federalism, cultural diversity, and constitutional law in Canada and other countries (especially Australia).
 
His current writing continues these themes, now focusing on legal pluralism and the principal features of a truly democratic, agonistic, constitutionalism. He is the author of Reimagining Canada: Language, Culture, Community and the Canadian Constitution (1994), The Constitution of Canada: A Contextual Analysis (second edition: 2021), and Las gramáticas de la ley: Derecho, pluralismo y justicia (2017). Professor Webber began his career at McGill University (1987-1998), was Dean of Law at the University of Sydney (1998-2002), then Canada Research Chair in Law and Society at the University of Victoria (2002-2014), until he surrendered that chair to become Dean of Law at UVic (2013-2018) and finally Professor Emeritus from 2023 until now.
 
He was appointed a Fellow of the Trudeau Foundation in 2009, Fellow of Royal Society of Canada in 2016, Honorary Professorial Fellow at the University of Melbourne in 2023, and Honorary Professor at Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary, in 2024.

Education

  • BA Honours (Political Science), University of British Columbia
  • LLB and BCL, McGill University
  • LLM, Osgoode Hall Law School.

Selected books

  • Las gramáticas de la ley: Derecho, pluralismo y justicia (Barcelona: Anthropos, 2017), trans Francisco Beltrán Adell and Álvaro R. Córdova Flores.
  • The Constitution of Canada: A Contextual Analysis (Oxford: Hart Publishing, 1st edition 2015, 2nd edition 2021).
  • Reimagining Canada: Language, Culture, Community and the Canadian Constitution (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1994).

Selected journal publications

  • “A Democracy-Friendly Theory of the Rule of Law”, (2024) 16(2) Hague Journal on the Rule of Law 339-374.
  • “Understanding Populism”, (2023) 32(6) Social and Legal Studies 849-876.
  • "A Nationalism Open Towards the World”, in Rajeev Bhargava, ed, Politics, Ethics and the Self: Re-reading Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj (New Delhi: Routledge, 2022), 162-189.
  • “Governing Ourselves: Reflections on Reinvigorating Democracy Stimulated by Gitxsan Governance”, in James Tully, Keith Cherry, Fonna Forman, Jeanne Morefield, Joshua Nichols, Pablo Ouziel, David Owen, and Oliver Schmidtke, eds, Democratic Multiplicity: Perceiving, Enacting and Integrating Democratic Diversity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022), 281-303.
  • “Federalism’s Radical Potential”, (2020) 18(4) International Journal of Constitutional Law (Symposium on Peace Processes & Constitution-Making) 1324-1349.
  • (with Val Napoleon, Mireille Fournier, and John Borrows) “Sally Engle Merry, Legal Pluralism, and the Radicalization of Comparative Law” (2020) 54 Law and Society Review 846-857.
  • “Recognition in Its Place,” in Daniel Weinstock, Jacob Levy and Jocelyn Maclure, eds, Interpreting Modernity: Essays on the Work of Charles Taylor (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2020), 247-264.

Recognition and awards

  • Doctor et professor iuris constitutionalis honoris causa, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary, 2024.
  • Honorary Professorial Fellow, University of Melbourne, 2023 to present.
  • Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, 2016 to present.
  • Distinguished Visiting Mentor, College of Law, Australian National University, August 2012.
  • Trudeau Fellow, 2009-2012.
  • Canada Research Chair in Law & Society, 2002, renewed 2009.
  • Law Students Society First-Year Teaching Award, University of Victoria, 2007-08.
  • Labouring Lives winner of the Ontario Historical Society’s J.J. Talman Award as “the best book on Ontario’s social, economic, political or cultural history published in the past three years”, 1998.
  • Reimagining Canada named a Choice Outstanding Academic Book, 1995.

Areas of graduate supervision

Prof. Webber supervises graduate students working on legal theory, constitutional law, and Indigenous peoples and law.