CANADIAN CONSTRAINTS ON JUDICIALIZATION FROM WITHOUT

Canada's adoption of a constitutional Charter of Rights and Freedoms h as led to a limited judicialization of politics which has been felt mo stly in the field of criminal justice. But judicialization in major fi elds of social and economic policy has been limited by the Charter's t erms and by judicial self-restraint. The Charter's principal impact on the country's political life is not a transfer of power to the judici ary but a juridicalization of political discourse. Divisive moral and constitutional issues have been permeated with ''rights talk.'' This m akes consensual resolution of these issues more difficult.