Pablo Echeverri, a Robbins Post-Doctoral Fellow since 2015, was recently published in the Chicago-Kent Journal of International and Comparative Law. His paper, “The 2015 Power-Balancing Reform in Colombia: a missed opportunity to disrupt the ecosystem of structural clientelism in the halls of justice,” examines the reform’s failure to achieve a meaningful restructuring of Colombia’s judiciary. An abbreviated abstract for Mr. Echeverri’s paper can be read below:
“In roughly 15 years, Colombia rose from the ashes of a quasi-failed state to become a magnet for foreign investment and tourism. Despite enormous progress in security and economic development, the country’s judicial institutions are perceived as inefficient and untrustworthy. This is often attributed to the resilient aura of clientelism that surrounds them. Without dismissing the cultural roots of clientelism, this article addresses its structural causes. The chief cause is the “revolving door,” a favor-trading market in which judicial officers use their constitutional powers to nominate and appoint other judicial officers for personal advancement, often referred to as the “I elect you, you elect me” mechanism. The 2015 constitutional reform was a missed opportunity to redesign the roles of judicial officers and remove the web of perverse incentives that gives birth to the revolving door. This goal could be at least partially achieved by imposing a set of restrictions on the types of positions that outgoing judicial officers may accept, which would limit political maneuvering without discouraging upward mobility within the halls of justice.”
Mr. Echeverri will be expanding on ideas and research pertaining to judicial independence and accountability in Latin America for a conference held at the Robbins Collection in December. Mr. Echeverri’s full, published paper can be read in the journal’s second issue of the seventh volume and on Chicago-Kent’s website: