The Opinion-Writing Function of the Judiciary of Latin American Governments in Transition to Democracy: Martinez v. Provincia de Mendoza

2019 ◽  
pp. 299-308
Author(s):  
Joseph Goldstein
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Opinion Writing

Latin America’s Presidentas

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Reyes-Housholder ◽  
Gwynn Thoma
Keyword(s):  
Gender Equality ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Central Component ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
Female Executives ◽  
Presidential Candidates ◽  
Female Presidents ◽  
Political Experience ◽  
Women's Participation

Catherine Reyes-Housholder and Gwynn Thomas highlight the unexpected emergence of female presidents and presidential candidates in Latin American politics. They point out that theories explaining the election of female executives globally fail to account for the rise of female presidents in Latin America and argue that the transition to democracy, women’s increasing political experience, the rise of the left, and recent political party crises have provided new opportunities for women in the presidency. However, female presidents must continually manage gendered expectations created from men’s past dominance of presidential power. While they appear similarly as successful governing as male presidents, only Michelle Bachelet has made gender equality a central component of her agenda. Female presidents have not used their constitutional powers to enact many gender equality policies, but in certain circumstances, they have been more likely than men to appoint women to their cabinets. Female presidents also have had some positive consequences for women’s participation in politics.

scholarly journals La doctrina de la Drittwirkung der Grundrechte en la jurisprudencia de la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos

2007 ◽  
pp. 583 ◽  
Author(s):  
Javier Mijangos González
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
The United States ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Common Denominator ◽  
Latin American History ◽  
State Action

Through a study of the jurisprudence of the region over the last twenty years, it becomes possible to see that the CIDH has constructed an entire theory about the applicability of fundamental rights in relations between individuals in Latin America. Through this theory it has addressed the most important social problems in contemporary Latin American history, thus contributing to the transition to democracy for many countries in the region. The study will analyze the stages that the jurisprudence of the CIDH has passed through and which have led to the current criteria that this organization uses. The first stage consists of a series of rulings whose common denominator is the analysis of the obligation of respect and vigilance for fundamental rights by the states listed in article 1.1 of the American Convention on Human Rights. This principle, which is ever-present in its jurisprudence, brings the Inter-American Court to approaches that are similar to those proposed by the United States doctrine of state action, as it makes use of a good number of rulings made by the Supreme Court of the United States between 1960 and 1980. In the second stage, the importance originally placed on determining the characteristics of the agent who committed the violation of fundamental rights is replaced by a series of approaches in which the nature of the actual violation itself becomes the focus. In this phase, the Inter-American Court establishes the idea that the fundamental rights listed in the Convention are erga omnes obligations that are imposed not only in relation to the power of the State but also with respect to the actions of third-party individuals. Finally, the third stage in the evolution of the court’s jurisprudence is represented by the most pertinent case in this matter: Opinión Consultiva 18/03, requested by the United Mexican States regarding the legal status of immigrants. This resolution, which has established a trend up until today, definitively establishes the direct effectiveness of the fundamental rights in relations between individuals.

Coming to terms with the past. A framework for the study of justice in the transition to democracy

1998 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jon Elster
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
The Past ◽  
Collective Decisions ◽  
Dependent Variables ◽  
South Eastern Europe ◽  
Communist Countries ◽  
Latin American Countries ◽  
Political Decisions

After the transition from an authoritarian to a democratic regime, one commonly observes trials of the agents of the former regime and efforts to compensate its victims. In our century, waves of transitional justice have occured in German-occupied countries after 1941, in South- Eastern Europe in the 1970s, in Latin-American countries in the 1980s, and in post-Communist countries after 1989. The article proposes a framework for the behavioral study of these phenomena. The dependent variables are political decisions to pursue retroactive justice after the transition. Independent variables include the constraints of the actors, their motivations and beliefs, as well as the mechanisms by which individual policy preferences are aggregated into binding collective decisions.

The Authority and Power of Regional Economic Courts in Latin America and the Caribbean

2020 ◽  
pp. 214-258
Author(s):  
Salvatore Caserta
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Central American ◽  
Regional Economic ◽  
Regional Institutions ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
State Actors ◽  
Caribbean Court Of Justice ◽  
Lack Of Commitment

This chapter compares the authority of the Central American Court of Justice (CACJ) and the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) with that of the Andean Tribunal of Justice (ATJ) and the Mercosur Permanent Review Court (PRC) and, in so doing, draws general conclusions about the actors and factors that may be deemed of importance for better understanding the de facto authority of the Latin American and Caribbean Regional Economic Courts (RECs). More specifically, it shows that, similar to the CCJ, the ATJ has been relatively successful in achieving authority, at least in the area of intellectual property (IP) law. This occurred thanks to the Court’s ability to develop a relationship with state and sub-state actors, such as administrative agencies and national judges, which repeatedly filed preliminary rulings on these topics, thus allowing the Court to make a difference in this area of law. The chapter also shows the fluctuations of the authority of the ATJ on classic matters of community law, such as removal of trade barriers and the implementation of the policies of the Andean Community. In contrast, the Mercosur PRC has struggled throughout its history to ensure that it receives a steady flow of cases to rule upon and has been repeatedly criticised by both state and sub-state actors. This final chapter shows that this reality is a symptom of political instability, lack of commitment to regional institutions, authoritarian politics, and struggle to complete the transition to democracy in the Mercosur Member States. Against this background, the chapter draws general theoretical conclusions on the authority of the four RECs in Latin American and the Caribbean.

Violence Against Women

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Montserrat Sagot
Keyword(s):  
Violence Against Women ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Social Problems ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Lethal Violence ◽  
The Public ◽  
Gender Oppression ◽  
Public Agenda ◽  
New Concepts ◽  
Feminist Movements

Beginning in the 1980s, Latin American feminist movements identified violence against women as one the main social problems in the region, resulting from a system of gender oppression intertwined with economic and political oppression. This chapter discusses Latin American scholarship’s most important theoretical contributions to the study of violence against women, as well as the proposals for addressing the problem and the controversies around those proposals. The chapter first traces the analyses of this form of violence under dictatorships. It then addresses how the transition to democracy afforded feminists opportunities to put the issue on the public agenda. The chapter also presents new concepts that have been developed to understand the escalation of lethal violence, as well as Latin American scholars’ and activists’ most recent strategies for ending violence against women.

The Transition to Democracy in Central Europe: A Comparative View

1991 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-151 ◽  
Author(s):  
Attila Ágh
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Central And Eastern Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
New Democracies ◽  
Political Dimension ◽  
Simple Notion ◽  
Europe Today ◽  
Latin American Countries

ABSTRACTThe collapse of Communist regimes in Eastern Europe has also caused the collapse of old-fashioned studies of Communist systems that subscribed to a simple notion of totalitarian uniformity, or a static belief in the continuance of self-equilibrating cycles within socialist states. To understand what is happening in Central and Eastern Europe today we need to be discriminating in a choice of paradigms. European conceptions of democracy as having a socio-economic as well as political dimension are more relevant than formalist American definitions. Moreover, Europe, in the form of the European Community, is also a much more immediate influence than the United States upon what is happening in Central or Eastern Europe. The transition to democracy in Southern Europe provides encouraging models for ex-Soviet satellites. The failure of Latin American countries to democratize provides warnings, such as the risk that Presidential government can produce dictatorship or instability, a risk that is present in new democracies in Europe too.

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