Courts in Latin America

Gretchen Helmke, Julio Rios-Figueroa

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN:
  9781107001091
• eBook ISBN:
  9781139036832
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: American Government
• Index: Politics & International Relations

To what extent do courts in Latin America protect individual rights and limit governments? This volume answers these fundamental questions by bringing together today's leading scholars of judicial politics. Drawing on examples from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Colombia, Costa Rica and Bolivia, the authors demonstrate that there is widespread variation in the performance of Latin America's constitutional courts. In accounting for this variation, the contributors push forward ongoing debates about what motivates judges; whether institutions, partisan politics and public support shape inter-branch relations; and the importance of judicial attitudes and legal culture. The authors deploy a range of methods, including qualitative case studies, paired country comparisons, statistical analysis and game theory.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Contributors
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: Courts in Latin America
• 1 Institutions for Constitutional Justice in Latin America
• 2 Enforcing Rights and Exercising an Accountability Function: Costa Rica’s Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court
• 3 Strategic Deference in the Colombian Constitutional Court, 1992–2006
• 4 From Quietism to Incipient Activism: The Institutional and Ideological Roots of Rights Adjudication in Chile
• 5 “Faithful Servants of the Regime”: The Brazilian Constitutional Court’s Role under the 1988 Constitution
• 6 Power Broker, Policy Maker, or Rights Protector?: The Brazilian Supremo Tribunal Federal in Transition
• 7 Legalist versus Interpretativist: The Supreme Court and the Democratic Transition in Mexico
• 8 A Theory of the Politically Independent Judiciary: A Comparative Study of the United States and Argentina
• 9 Courts, Power, and Rights in Argentina and Chile
• 10 Bolivia: The Rise (and Fall) of Judicial Review
• 11 The Puzzling Judicial Politics of Latin America: A Theory of Litigation, Judicial Decisions, and Interbranch Conflict
• Index