Amy Swiffen, PhD

Education

Research interests

Amy Swiffen’s research examines the relationship of law, power, and society, with particular attention to settler colonial contexts and constitutional and Aboriginal law. Her publications address how legal relations are embedded in social contexts, including in the framing of hate crimes, the criminalisation of HIV non-disclosure, and the role of law in settler colonial governance. Her work on the relationship between Aboriginal self-government and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms has been cited by the Supreme Court of Canada. She also extends socio-legal theory through engagement with Walter Benjamin and Michel Foucault. In this research, she reinterprets Foucault’s framework of biopolitics to address the settler colonial contexts of Canada, highlighting the role of law in mediating the relationship between sovereignty, territory, and population. She draws on Benjamin’s analysis of the relationship between law and violence to supplement Foucault's theories in a way that takes account of the existence of Indigenous legal orders. Her work has been supported through visiting professorships and major research grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the Fonds de recherche du Québec. Currently, she leads a SSHRC-funded project on a 1927 amendment to Canada’s Indian Act (Section 141) that prohibited Indigenous peoples from fundraising or retaining legal counsel to pursue claims in court. The project examines how Section 141 was interpreted and used by the government to target Indigenous leaders and suppress some forms of Indigenous advocacy. She serves as Co-Editor-in-Chief of The Canadian Journal of Law and Society, co-editor of the book series Paradigms of Public Power (University of Toronto Press), and has held the roles of Department Chair and Graduate Program Director.