• Assistant Professor, Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario

Dr Debra M Haak PhD (Queen's), MPhil (St Andrews), LLB (UNB), BA Hons (Western) is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Law at Queen's University where she teaches Criminal and Constitutional Law.

Debra's research is concerned with how legal decision makers contend with interests, rights, and values in tension in a liberal democracy where rights are constitutionally protected. She is increasingly interested in whether, how, and why substantive and procedural features of Charter litigation may prioritize some interests, rights and/or values over others. For more than a decade, Debra's research has focussed on the intractable debate over the role of law in the commercial exchange of sexual touching. Her current research project - Sex in the Age of Gender - aims to bring conceptual clarity to human rights protections based on sex and those based on gender. Her research has been published in the UBC Law Review, the Windsor Review of Legal and Social Issues, the Queen's Law Journal, the Supreme Court Law Review, The Globe & Mail, National Post, Ottawa Citizen and in other print media and online publications across Canada.

Debra practiced commercial and insolvency litigation at Gowlings (formerly Smith Lyons) in Toronto for 20 years, and appeared regularly before all levels of court in Ontario. She spent one court year at the Inns of Court in London, England, as the recipient of the prestigious Harold G Fox Foundation Scholarship. She marshaled for The Hon Mr. Justice John Thomas (later Baron Thomas of Cwmgiedd, Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales).

• 2020–present Assistant Professor, Queen's University, Canada
• 2020–2021 Postdoctoral Fellow, Queen's University, Canada
• 2016–2020 Adjunct Professor/Visiting Scholar, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Canada
• 2015–2019 Teaching Fellow, Queen's University, Canada
• 1993–2016 Partner/Associate, Gowling WLG

• 2019 Queen's University, PhD
• 1996 Law Society of Upper Canada, Called to the Ontario Bar
• 1995 University of New Brunswick, LLB
• 1993 University of St Andrews, MPhil
• 1990 University of Western Ontario, BA (Hons)

• 2024 Two Different Conceptions of Equality: Assessing the Constitutionality of Commercial Sex Laws in Canada” Supreme Court Law Review, Supreme Court Law Review
• 2023 Revisiting the Analytical Distinction Between Section 7 and Section 1 of the Charter: Legislative Objectives, Policy Goals, and Public Interests, 112 Supreme Court Law Review 115
• 2022 The Case of the Reasonable Hypothetical Sex Worker, 60:1 Alberta LR
• 2021 The Good Governance of Empirical Evidence About Prostitution, Sex Work, and Sex Trafficking in Constitutional Litigation, 46:2 Queen's LJ 187
• 2019 Re(De)fining Prostitution and Sex Work: Conceptual Clarity for Legal Thinking, 40 Windsor Rev Leg Soc Issues 67
• 2017 The Initial Test of Constitutional Validity: Identifying the Legislative Objectives of Canada's New Prostitution Laws, 50:3 UBC L Rev 657

• 2023 Sex in the Age of Gender Role: Funding Source: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
• 2023 Sex in the Age of Gender Role: Funding Source: Canadian Bar Association

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