Reconstructing Gladue

Section 718.2(e) of the Criminal Code directs sentencing judges to exercise restraint in the use of incarceration ‘with particular attention to the circumstances of Aboriginal offenders.’ In R v Gladue, the Supreme Court of Canada interpreted this as a remedial provision aiming to reduce the incarceration of Indigenous people. That has made it appear to be a failure by its own lights. Yet to write off section 718.2(e) and the Gladue principles would be to fail properly to understand their moral foundations and structure. Judges are called upon to reduce the incarceration of Indigenous people neither by working backwards from prison demographic targets nor merely by combating implicit bias. Rather, Gladue requires judges to open their minds to hitherto unappreciated reasons that many Indigenous offenders should be afforded mitigation, restorative justice, and community-based accountability. One reason, we argue, relates to the unfair criminogenic disadvantages disproportionately faced by Indigenous offenders. Another reason is that the Canadian state’s complicity in such disadvantages calls into question its legitimate authority and its standing to blame Indigenous offenders. In sum, Gladue calls upon our courts to widen the horizon of fairness in their treatment of Indigenous people. This matters for its own sake in each and every case, whether or not it brings about an appreciable reduction in Indigenous incarceration in the aggregate. Our reconstruction of Gladue not only rescues it from cynical dismissals but also helps to solve the central doctrinal puzzles surrounding it: how Indigenous offenders’ unique life circumstances must be connected to their offences to be mitigating; how Gladue principles should apply differently to more and less serious offences; how a variant of Gladue principles should be extended to members of other disadvantaged groups such as Black Canadians; and how judges should weigh the interests of Indigenous victims when sentencing Indigenous offenders.