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The Estates General of French Canada were a series of conferences held from 1966 to 1969 which gathered over a thousand delegates from Quebec, Acadia, Ontario and Western Canada. These last patriotic assemblies organized after the Congrès de la langue française (1912, 1937, 1952) marked an important turning point in the history of French-Canadian nationalism and in that of the relationship between Quebec and the Canadian Francophonie.

The Calder case (1973) — named for politician and Nisga’a chief Frank Calder, who brought the case before the courts — reviewed the existence of Aboriginal title (i.e., ownership) claimed over lands historically occupied by the Nisga’a peoples of northwestern British Columbia. While the case was lost, the Supreme Court of Canada’s ruling nevertheless recognized for the first time that Aboriginal title has a place in Canadian law. The Calder case (also known as Calder et al. v. Attorney General of British Columbia) is considered the foundation for the Nisga’a Treaty in 2000 — the first modern land claim in British Columbia that gave the Nisga’a people self-government.

Media convergence refers to the merging of previously distinct media technologies and platforms through digitization and computer networking. This is also known as technological convergence. Media convergence is also a business strategy whereby communications companies integrate their ownership of different media properties. This is also called media consolidation, media concentration or economic convergence. (See also Media Ownership.)

Omar Khadr is a Toronto-born Canadian, captured by American soldiers after a firefight in Afghanistan in 2002, when he was 15 years old. The only minor since the Second World War to be convicted of purported war crimes, Khadr was imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay and Canada for almost 13 years in total. In 2010, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that Khadr’s detainment violated “the principles of fundamental justice” and “the most basic Canadian standards about the treatment of youth suspects.” Despite repeated attempts by the Canadian government to keep him in prison, Khadr was released on bail in May 2015. In July 2017, he received $10.5 million in compensation from the government for Canada’s role in violating his constitutional rights. In March 2019, an Alberta judge declared that Khadr had completed his war crimes sentence, making him a free man.

The labour market is a generalized concept denoting the interaction between the supply (number of persons available for work) and the demand (number of jobs available) and the wage rate.

Founded in 1982 and disbanded in 2005, this advocacy group defended the interests of English-speaking Quebecers for over 20 years.

Québec solidaire is a progressive, left-wing provincial political party officially formed on 4 February 2006 in Montreal. Its key principles and values are the environment, social justice, feminism, alter-globalization, democracy, pluralism, sovereignty and solidarity. After four general elections, Québec solidaire has elected three members to the National Assembly of Quebec and is the fourth largest party. Since May 2017, its parliamentary spokespersons are Manon Massé and Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois.

A contract is a legally binding agreement between two or more persons for a particular purpose. It is an instrument for the economic exchange of goods and services. In Canada, contract law is administered both in common law and, in Quebec, civil law.

The Halibut Treaty of 1923 (formally the Convention for the Preservation of Halibut Fishery of the Northern Pacific Ocean) was an agreement between Canada and the United States on fishing rights in the Pacific Ocean. It was the first environmental treaty aimed at conserving an ocean fish stock. It was also the first treaty independently negotiated and signed by the Canadian government; one of several landmark events that transitioned Canada into an autonomous sovereign state. It also indicated a shift in Canada’s economic focus from Britain to the US during the 1920s, when the US passed Britain as Canada’s largest trading partner. The treaty created the International Pacific Halibut Commission, which continues in its role today.

The distinction is often made between the immigration policy of Quebec, that of Canada (see Immigration Policy in Canada) and that of other provinces. The particularities of the Québécois policy are essentially rooted in history, language, and culture. Despite these differences, immigration plays just as important a role in the Québécois society as it does elsewhere in the country. From 2015 to 2019, Quebec welcomed almost 250,000 permanent immigrants. Every year, the province also hosts thousands of temporary foreign workers, three quarters of whom find employment in the greater metropolitan area of Montreal. (See Canada’s Temporary Foreign Worker Programs.)

Jim Keegstra was a secondary school teacher in rural Alberta who taught anti-Semitic propaganda to his students. He was charged with a hate crime in 1984 and was found guilty in 1985. However, Keegstra launched repeated appeals arguing that the Criminal Code violated his constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression. The landmark case (R. v. Keegstra) tested the balance between the right to freedom of speech outlined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the law’s limits on hate speech stipulated in the Criminal Code. The case came before the Supreme Court of Canada in 1990 and 1996. The Court ultimately ruled against Keegstra by deciding that Canada’s hate laws imposed a “reasonable limit” on a person’s freedom of expression.

Under Canada’s federal system, the powers of government are shared between the federal government and 10 provincial governments. The Constitution Act, 1867 granted specific jurisdiction to the provinces in 16 areas, compared to 29 for the federal government. However, provincial powers have expanded since then. Provinces can levy direct taxation and derive most of their non-tax revenue from the use of public lands and natural resources. Provincial governments in Canada are modelled on the British Westminster parliamentary tradition and reflect the principles of responsible government. They comprise an elected legislative assembly, from which a governing cabinet is selected by the premier. The lieutenant-governor assents to legislation as the representative of the Crown.

Late in the evening on Saturday, 18 April 2020, a 51-year-old man assaulted his common-law wife in Portapique, Nova Scotia. He then began a 13-hour rampage in which he committed multiple shootings and set fire to several homes in 16 locations. Using a vehicle disguised as an RCMP police cruiser and wearing an old RCMP uniform for much of the time, the killer murdered 22 people and injured six others. He was shot and killed by two RCMP officers at a gas station south of Enfield, Nova Scotia, 100 km from where the violence began. It is the worst mass killing in modern Canadian history.

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Political patronage in Canada is a broad term covering the granting of favours, money, jobs, government contracts or appointments to individuals or corporations in exchange for political or monetary support. Patronage can range from the relatively benign — political campaign members are frequently hired as staff members for elected officials — to outright corruption and fraud. Patronage is linked to lobbying, conflict of interest and corruption and is therefore a politically volatile subject. Though some efforts have been made to discourage patronage, the practice remains a fixture of Canadian political life.