w/ Prof. Zoran Oklopcic

The recent political crisis in Ukraine is unfolding at the interstice of high-stakes geopolitics, inflamed popular emotions and the looming questions of constitutional design. Given its ethno-political diversity and the involvement of great powers, a number of commentators have likened the crisis in Ukraine to the beginning of the violent dissolution of the former Yugoslavia. The talk will interrogate not only whether the post-conflict constitutional making in the former Yugoslavia has valuable lessons for Ukraine, but also whether the Canadian experience with the constitutional regulation of secession can provide the principled framework for defusing some of most explosive issues in the conflict, such as the status of the Crimean peninsula.