Available in Russian
Author: Tatiana Vasilieva
DOI: 10.21128/1812-7126-2024-4-85-104
Keywords: сonstitution; citizen participation; indigenous peoples; ecological constitutionalism; Latin America
Despite their common approaches, Latin American constitutions are characterized by national uniqueness. The countries of the region have made a significant contribution to the development of constitutionalism ideas by proposing the concepts of socialization of constitutions, judicial orders for the protection of constitutional rights and habeas data. In the process of democratizing political regimes, these countries have turned to their cultural origins, traditional notions of power and its legitimacy. The new constituent acts trace a change in the priorities of public policy, primarily due to the recognition of the principles of pluralism and diversity in various modifications, including legal pluralism, which implies the rejection of legal monism and the adaptation of national legal systems to the existence of traditional normative systems. Many Latin American constitutions are oriented towards participatory principles, citizen participation in public policy and social control. This is due, on the one hand, to the desire to overcome the consequences of authoritarian rule and, on the other hand, to the involvement of civil society institutions in the drafting of new constituent acts. According to expert estimates, indigenous peoples constitute 10% of the region’s population, and the interests of these peoples are expressed in the new constitutions by recognizing indigenous peoples and their associations as collective political entities; by establishing traditional forms of participation and representation for these peoples; and by allowing them to apply their own rules in relations between representatives of these peoples. The States of the region were among the first to realize the need to adjust anthropocentric approaches and recognize the rights of nature and its elements to exist and develop independently of human interests and needs. In the constitutions of Latin American States, there is a desire to develop original documents that take into account modern trends in the development of constitutional institutions and traditional legal culture, propose new approaches to solving the problems of overcoming the crisis of trust in the relationship between citizens and public authorities. These constituent acts contain many provisions “for the future”, which indicate the directions of regulation and may receive substantial content in the future.
About the author: Tatiana Vasilieva – Doctor of Sciences in Law, Associate Professor, Chief Research Fellow, Human Rights Department, Institute of State and Law, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow.
Citation: Vasilieva T. (2024) Problemy preemstvennosti i novatorstva v konstitutsionnom razvitii: latinoamerikanskaya praktika [Challenges of continuity and innovation in constitutional development: Latin American practice]. Sravnitel'noe konstitutsionnoe obozrenie, vol.33, no.4, pp.85–104. (In Russian).
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