Claire Houston
Academic Degrees:
B.A. (Hons.) (Trent University), LL.B. (Queen’s University), LL.M. (Harvard Law School) (waived), S.J.D. (Harvard Law School)
| Email: | claire.houston@uwo.ca |
| Phone: | 519 661-2111 ext. 88405 |
| Office: | LB 22 |
Professor Claire Houston joined Western Law in 2018. She teaches and researches primarily in family law and children’s law. Her scholarship explores the rights of children in family law disputes, feminist legal theory and family law, and access to family justice. Professor Houston was the 2021 recipient of the Western Law Dean’s Research Fellowship. In 2023, Professor Houston received Western Law’s Award for Teaching Excellence.
Professor Houston’s work has been published, or is forthcoming, in the McGill Law Journal, Canadian Journal of Family Law, Michigan Journal of Gender and Law, Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law, and Family Court Review. Her scholarship has been supported by grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), Law Foundation of Ontario, and University of Western Ontario. She is co-editor (with Mary-Jo Maur and Nicholas Bala) of the casebook Family Law: Text, Cases, Materials & Notes, 10th Edition. Professor Houston is a frequent presenter at judicial education seminars and professional education programs for family lawyers.
Professor Houston completed her S.J.D. at Harvard Law School where she was a Byse Teaching Fellow and Julius B. Richmond Fellow at Harvard University’s Centre on the Developing Child. She also holds an LL.B. from Queen’s University and a B.A. (Hons) from Trent University. She articled at the Ontario Office of the Children’s Lawyer before clerking for Justices Goudge, Laskin, Rosenberg, and Simmons of the Ontario Court of Appeal.
Research Highlights
Articles
Claire Houston, “Best Interests or Autonomy? Navigating Parenting Disputes Over Children’s Treatment” (2025) 70:4 McGill Law Journal (forthcoming).
Claire Houston, Rachel Birnbaum & Nicholas Bala, “Exploring the Costs and Benefits of Virtual Family Law in Ontario: Perspectives of Professionals” (2024) 102:3 Canadian Bar Review 1.
Claire Houston, “Spousal Support for Men: An Analysis of Reported Canadian Decisions” (2023) 42 Canadian Family Law Quarterly 1.
Claire Houston, Rachel Birnbaum & Nicholas Bala, “Moving Towards a Post-Pandemic ’New Normal’: Perspectives of Ontario Family Justice Professionals and Self-Represented Litigants” (2022) 41 Canadian Family Law Quarterly 1.
Claire Houston, Rachel Birnbaum, Nicholas Bala & Kate Deveau, “Ontario Family Justice in ‘Lockdown’: Early Pandemic Cases and Professional Experience” (2022) 60 Family Court Review 241.
Claire Houston, “Respecting and Protecting Transgender and Gender-Nonconforming Children in Family Courts” (2020) 33 Canadian Journal of Family Law 103.
Claire Houston, “The Trouble with Feminist Advocacy Around Child Victims of Domestic Violence” (2018) 39 Women’s Rights Law Reporter 85.
Claire Houston, “Whatever Happened to the Child Maltreatment Revolution” (2017) 19 Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law 1.
Claire Houston, Nicholas Bala & Michael Saini, “Crossover Cases of High-Conflict Families Involving Child Protection Services: Ontario Research Findings and Suggestions for Good Practice” (2017) 55 Family Court Review 362.
Claire Houston, “How Feminist Theory Became (Criminal) Law: Tracing the Path to Mandatory Criminal Interventions in Domestic Violence Cases” (2014) 21 Michigan Journal of Gender and Law 217 (excerpted in Nancy K.D. Lemon, Domestic Violence Law, 5th ed., 2018).
Book Chapters
Claire Houston, “Social Parenthood in Canada” in Clare Huntington, Courtney Joslin and Christiane von Bary, Social Parenthood in Comparative Perspective (New York University Press, 2023).
Case Comments and Annotations
Claire Houston, “Case Annotation: A v A” (2022) 81 Canadian Cases on the Law of Torts (4th) 130.
Claire Houston, “Case Comment: Undermining Children’s Rights in AM v CH” (2020) 39 Canadian Family Law Quarterly 99.
Claire Houston, “Case Comment: M (Children), Re” (2018) 7 Reports of Family Law (8th) 95.
Claire Houston, “Case Comment: Manitoba (Director of Child & Family Services) v C (A)” (2009) 65 Reports of Family Law 397.
