This introductory chapter explores this landscape of changing legal cultures in Latin America, emphasizing the repertoires of legal ideas and practices that accompany, cause, and are a consequence of the judicialization of politics. It argues that a focus on the concept of legal cultures offers three distinct contributions to current debates on politics, law, and society. First, it pushes scholars of courts to take seriously the role that ideas, language, and informal practices play in judicial politics. Second, it pushes the debate on judicialization in Latin America beyond the courts and, more profoundly, beyond the state. Third, by exploring the specific forms judicialization processes take in Latin America, it teaches us something new about law and politics.
(2010) “Cultures of Legality: Judicialization and Political Activism in Contemporary Latin America,” in Javier Couso, Alex Huneeus and Rachel Sieder (eds). Cultures of Legality: Judicialization and Political Activism in Latin America. Cambridge University Press: 3-21. ISBN: 978-0-521-76723-1