Grade 12 Canadian and International Law (CLN4U) - Unit 1: Jurisprudence, Marxist Theory, and Legal Structures

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering legal philosophy (natural law, feminist jurisprudence, Marxist legal theory), Canadian constitutional sources, court hierarchies, and categories of substantive and procedural law.

Jurisprudence

The philosophical and theoretical study of law, which involves developing conceptions of law, justice, rights, authority, power, and society to analyze legal issues.

Legal Level of Legal Thinking

The analytical level of legal inquiry focused on what the law says, including the conduct it prohibits, permits, or requires, statutory definitions, established facts, created rights, and relevant judicial precedents.

Applied Level of Legal Thinking

The stage of legal analysis addressing how a specific law applies to a particular case, evaluating the relevance of evidence, the arguments available to opposing sides, and whether intended legislative outcomes are achieved.

Jurisprudential Level of Legal Thinking

The highest level of legal thinking examining the philosophical meaning and societal impact of the law, including whose interests are protected, who bears the costs, and how conflicts between law and morality should be resolved.

Natural Law

A legal and philosophical theory asserting that human beings possess intrinsic moral values governing reason and behavior, establishing higher principles of morality and justice accessible via human reason against which positive laws are evaluated.

Thomas Aquinas

A Catholic theologian and philosopher (c. 1225–1274) who identified God as the source of natural law and argued that human laws must conform to natural moral principles to be valid, declaring an unjust law to be a perversion of law.

Feminist Jurisprudence

The analysis and critique of the legal system as a patriarchal institution, exposing the systemic exclusion of marginalized voices and challenging assumptions of judicial neutrality and objectivity.

Patriarchy

A social structure and set of practices through which men dominate, oppress, and exploit women, other men, and gender-diverse individuals across areas such as paid labour, the state, the household, cultural institutions, and sexuality.

Rape Culture

A cultural environment in which sexual violence is normalized, institutions protect perpetrators and promote impunity, victims are blamed and shamed for their assault, and women are expected to alter their conduct to avoid harm.

Mentally Incapacitated (N.Y. Penal Law § 130.00)

A statutory state in which a person is rendered temporarily incapable of appraising or controlling their conduct due to the administration of a narcotic or intoxicating substance without their consent.

Video Recordings Act 1984

Legislation passed by the British Parliament following the 'video nasties' controversy, establishing a compulsory video classification regime under the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) and criminalizing the supply of unrated videos.

Veil of Ignorance

A philosophical thought experiment proposed by John Rawls requiring individuals to design social, legal, and economic policies without knowing their own future status, wealth, health, or social standing.

Marxist Legal Theory

A theoretical approach that analyzes law through an economic lens, viewing legal systems as instruments that protect the interests and property of the ruling class while maintaining social inequality.

Bourgeoisie

The wealthy, dominant social class that represents a very small portion of the population but owns, controls, and profits from the means of production.

Proletariat

The working class who own no land or industry that generates profit and must sell their labour to the bourgeoisie in order to survive.

Means of Production

A term describing the physical non-human inputs used in producing goods and services, specifically including land, raw materials, factories, and capital.

Capitalism

An economic system characterized by private ownership of the means of production, operated for profit through capital accumulation, competitive markets, price systems, and wage labour.

Base and Superstructure

Karl Marx's societal model in which the economic base (forces and relations of production) generates and shapes the superstructure (legal systems, politics, culture, ideology, and social consciousness).

False Consciousness

A distorted understanding of reality held by the working class that prevents them from recognizing their exploitation, often leading them to accept or defend social systems that harm their own material interests.

Class Consciousness

The subjective awareness of shared systemic exploitation and class solidarity among the proletariat, considered essential by Marx for organizing collective action to overthrow the ruling class.

Social Murder

Friedrich Engels' concept describing premature, predictable working-class deaths resulting from dangerous and impoverished conditions knowingly imposed and maintained by the capitalist ruling class.

Cultural Hegemony

The maintenance of ruling-class domination achieved primarily through consensual social practices, norms, and institutions (such as schools, mass media, religious bodies, and families) rather than direct coercion.

Propaganda Model

A framework developed by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky explaining how corporate mass media manufactures public consent through five systemic filters: ownership, advertising, sourcing, flak, and anti-ideologies.

Flak

Negative feedback, institutional pressure, public censure, or disciplinary actions directed at media outlets and journalists who challenge powerful corporate or state interests.

Secondary Sources of Law

Codified laws and judicial precedents—including constitutional law, statute law, and case law—that have been written down in response to societal, religious, and philosophical values.

Canadian Constitution

The supreme law of Canada that outlines the framework for government, distributes legislative authority among levels of government, and takes precedence over all conflicting laws.

Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms

A constitutional document entrenched in 1982 under Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau that guarantees fundamental civil rights and freedoms and empowers the courts to strike down invalid legislation.

Statute

A formal, written law passed by elected representatives at either the federal level (Parliament of Canada) or provincial level (provincial legislatures).

Common Law

A legal system originating in medieval England based on accumulated judicial decisions and precedents rather than comprehensive statutory codes.

Stare Decisis (Rule of Precedent)

The foundational common law doctrine requiring judges to follow the legal rules and principles established in prior court decisions when adjudicating cases with similar facts.

Legal Fiction

An assumption and acceptance of an untrue premise by a court to allow an existing legal rule to operate in a just, equitable, or modified manner while leaving the letter of the law unaltered.

Supreme Court of Canada

Canada's highest and final court of appeal, consisting of the Chief Justice and eight puisne judges in accordance with the Supreme Court Act.

Substantive Law

The body of law that defines the legal rights, duties, and obligations of citizens and governments, divided into public law and private law.

Procedural Law

The rules and processes that prescribe the methods and steps required to enforce the rights, duties, and responsibilities defined within substantive law.

Public Law

A category of substantive law governing the structure and operations of government bodies and regulating relationships between the state and private individuals.

Private Law (Civil Law)

A category of substantive law that resolves disputes and regulates legal relationships and duties between private individuals or organizations.

Criminal Law

A branch of public law codified in the Criminal Code that defines offenses deemed to be crimes against society as a whole and specifies state penalties for offenders.

Administrative Law

A branch of public law regulating the legal authority, procedures, decisions, and remedies of public administrative agencies, tribunals, and regulatory boards.

Tort Law

A branch of private law founded entirely on case law that provides legal remedies and damages to individuals or organizations injured by the intentional or negligent conduct of others.

Contract Law

A branch of private law that governs legally enforceable agreements created through a mutual offer, acceptance, and consideration.

Domestic Law

The internal body of laws made, applied, and enforced strictly within the sovereign territorial borders and jurisdiction of a single nation-state.

International Law

The system of customs, treaties, and rules governing relations and conduct among independent sovereign nations without a central global enforcement authority.

Customs (International Law)

Consistent and general practices undertaken by sovereign states that are accepted and recognized by the international community as legally binding obligations.

Divisions of Canadian Law

The organizational hierarchy dividing Canadian law into substantive and procedural branches, further separating substantive law into public law (criminal, constitutional, administrative) and private law (family, contract, tort, property, labour).