A Radical Betrayal: A Review Essay of Allan Hutchinson's Waiting for CorafJEREMY DOLGIN
ABSTRACT
Taking as its focus Allan Hutchinson's Waiting for Coraf, this article examines the potential for progressive change made possible by constitutional rights. While accepting much of Hutchinson's radical conception of rights, the author challenges Hutchinson's conclusion that rights are ultimately anti-progressive and illegitimate. The author argues that Hutchinson's pessimism regarding the progressive potential of the Charter is deterministically negative, and that it is precisely the indeterminacy of rights that confers on the Charter its progressive potential. Furthermore, existing power relations mean that it is shortsighted to dismiss the rhetorical value of rights. The essay then focuses on Hutchinson's second critique that adjudication by an unelected elite is fundamentally undemocratic and illegitimate. The author offers a theory of rights as both indeterminate and legitimate while arguing that Hutchinson's claim about illegitimacy stems from his inability to take seriously his own 'radical' position.
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Citation: (1997) 55(1) U.T. Fac. L. Rev. 153.
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