University of Wisconsin–Madison

Month: November 2025

Kureshi (2025), “To Reinforce or Replace: Courts and Democratic Backsliding”

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Kureshi, Yasser. To Reinforce or Replace: Courts and Democratic Backsliding (2025). Government & Opposition. doi:10.1017/gov.2025.10015. Courts are often seen as defenders of democracy, but this article shows that empowered judiciaries can also enable democratic backsliding. Kureshi develops a framework distinguishing courts that reinforce political representation from those that replace elected institutions when fighting corruption. Through …

Pavone (2022), “The Ghostwriters: Lawyers and the Politics behind the Judicial Construction of Europe”

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Pavone, Tommaso. The Ghostwriters: Lawyers and the Politics behind the Judicial Construction of Europe. Cambridge Studies in Law and Society. Cambridge University Press, November 2022. Paperback. ISBN: 9781009074988. The Ghostwriters challenges the traditional, judge-centered narrative that portrays the European Union as a polity built primarily by judicial activism. Pavone uncovers the political work of practicing …

Gerzso (2023), “Judicial resistance during electoral disputes: Evidence from Kenya”

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Gerzso, Thalia. Judicial resistance during electoral disputes: Evidence from Kenya (2023). Electoral Studies, 85, 102653. Over the last decade, African courts have become central actors in the conduct of elections, sometimes even resisting incumbents during electoral disputes. This article asks when and why courts in hybrid regimes take the risk of siding with the opposition …

Manzi (2024), “Judicial Populism and Corruption Prosecutions in the Mani Pulite Operation”

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Manzi, Lucia. Judicial Populism and Corruption Prosecutions in the Mani Pulite Operation. Law & Social Inquiry (2024). Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Bar Foundation. This article develops a new analytical framework for understanding the success of Italy’s Mani Pulite (Clean Hands) anti-corruption operation by showing how prosecutors relied on a …

Kosař & Šipulová (2017), “The Strasbourg Court Meets Abusive Constitutionalism: Baka v. Hungary and the Rule of Law”

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Kosař, David & Šipulová, Katarína. The Strasbourg Court Meets Abusive Constitutionalism: Baka v. Hungary and the Rule of Law. Hague Journal on the Rule of Law, 10, 83–110 (2018). Published online November 2, 2017. DOI: 10.1007/s40803-017-0065-y. This article examines how the European Court of Human Rights responded to a textbook case of abusive constitutionalism: the …

Gárdos-Orosz & Szente (2021), Populist Challenges to Constitutional Interpretation in Europe and Beyond

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Gárdos-Orosz, Fruzsina & Szente, Zoltán (eds.). Populist Challenges to Constitutional Interpretation in Europe and Beyond. Routledge, Taylor & Francis, 2021. DOI: 10.4324/9781003148944. Available at: https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/49404 This edited volume examines how populist governments and movements influence the theory and practice of constitutional interpretation. The book asks whether populist regimes generate new interpretive doctrines or simply instrumentalize …

Baraybar & Gonzalez-Ocantos (2022), “Prosecutorial Agency, Backlash and Resistance in the Peruvian Chapter of Lava Jato”

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Baraybar, V., & Gonzalez-Ocantos, E. (2022). Prosecutorial Agency, Backlash and Resistance in the Peruvian Chapter of Lava Jato. In S. Botero, D. M. Brinks, & E. A. Gonzalez-Ocantos (Eds.), The Limits of Judicialization: From Progress to Backlash in Latin America (pp. 314–340). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Peru’s chapter of Lava Jato became one of the …

Kapiszewski (2011), “Tactical Balancing: High Court Decision Making on Politically Crucial Cases”

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Kapiszewski, Diana. Tactical Balancing: High Court Decision Making on Politically Crucial Cases (2011). Law & Society Review, 45(2), 471–506. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5893.2011.00437.x High court decision making in politically sensitive cases cannot be fully understood through ideological or strategic models alone. Kapiszewski advances the thesis of tactical balancing, arguing that justices weigh a specific set of considerations—including their …

Delaney, Dixon & Kosař (2025), “Chief Justices and Democratic Resilience: Judicial Leadership in Times of Constitutional Crisis”

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Delaney, Erin F., Rosalind Dixon, and David Kosař. Chief Justices and Democratic Resilience: Judicial Leadership in Times of Constitutional Crisis (2025). International Journal of Constitutional Law, Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 148–159. Chief justices play a pivotal role in safeguarding judicial legitimacy and democratic resilience, especially during periods of constitutional crisis. The authors argue that …

Garcia Holgado & Sánchez Urribarri (2023), “Court-packing and democratic decay: A necessary relationship?”

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Garcia Holgado, Benjamin & Sánchez Urribarri, Raúl. Court-packing and democratic decay: A necessary relationship? Global Constitutionalism 12(2): 350–377 (2023). This article challenges the common assumption that court-packing and democratic erosion are inherently linked. Drawing on rich case studies of Argentina under Carlos Menem (1989–1999) and Venezuela under Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro (1999–present), the authors …