Political Institutions and Lesbian and Gay Rights in the United States and Canada

by Smith; Miriam

• ISBN13: 9780415988711
• ISBN10: 0415988713
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-06-24
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Lesbian and gay citizens today enjoy a much broader array of rights and obligations and a greater ability to live their lives openly in both the U.S. and Canada. However, while human rights protections have been exponentially expanded in Canada over the last twenty years, even basic protections in areas such as employment discrimination are still unavailable to many in the United States. This book examines why these similar societies have produced such divergent policy outcomes, focusing on how differences between the political institutions of the U.S. and Canada have shaped the terrain of social movement and counter-movement mobilization. It analyzes cross-national variance in public policies toward lesbians and gay men, especially in the areas of the decriminalization of sodomy, the passage of anti-discrimination laws, and the enactment of measures to recognize same-sex relationships. For political science, sociology, and queer studies alike, this book will prove vital as movements for lesbian and gayrights continue to recast the social landscape in North America and beyond.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. vii
Acknowledgments	p. xiii
The Comparative Politics of Lesbian and Gay Rights	p. 1
Starting Points, 1969-1980	p. 31
Bowers and the Charter, 1980-1986	p. 58
Discrimination, From Romer to Vriend, 1986-2000	p. 77
The Emergence of Same-Sex Marriage, 1991-1999	p. 109
Policy Divergence and Policy Diffusion: Same-Sex Marriage in the 2000s	p. 134
Conclusions: Historical Institutionalism and Lesbian and Gay Rights	p. 168
Notes	p. 197
References	p. 203
Index	p. 225
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