"Human rights is everybody's job"
Professor Kathleen Mahoney is an international human rights lawyer, a Professor of Law at the University of Calgary and a speaker at our Bring Your Boomers Party.
Kathleen has dedicated much of her research, practice, and activism to internationally critical issues in human rights and appeared as counsel in leading cases in the Supreme Court of Canada. She has also organized and participated in collaborative human rights and judicial education projects in Geneva, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Tanzania, Namibia, Spain, Israel, China, Vietnam, the United States and the United Nations. She was a founder of the Women's Legal Education and Action Fund and a pioneer of the judicial education movement in Canada.
In 2004, Professor Mahoney spearheaded and authored a major research project and Report examining the Canadian government's response to the claims of Aboriginal residential school survivors. This led to her appointment as the Chief Negotiator for the Assembly of First Nations and the subsequent historic settlement agreement with Canada for reparations and a Truth and Reconciliation Process, which is unique in the world. Read more about Kathleen here.
Kathleen with be paired with Gen Whyer Caleb Behn who is of Eh Cho Dene and Dunne Za ancestry and is entering second year law at the University of Victoria. Prior to entering University of Victoria Law School, Caleb was a ‘Lands Manager’ for his home communities in Northeastern BC, working to protect the Treaty 8 First Nations interests in one of the most intensely industrially developed regions in Canada. His projects included planning, negotiating, and implementing Impact-Benefit Agreements with proponents as well as ensuring culturally appropriate and timely direct community engagement regarding all aspects of resource development. As a traditionally trained hunter, fisherman and trapper Caleb hopes to work on international regulation of geoengineering using traditional Indigenous teachings from Treaty 8 Elders.
Caleb and Kathleen will be engaging in inter-generation dialogue around human rights, indigenous rights and law's role in the re-imagination of society.
