The Mexican Supreme Court and its Contributions to Democratic Transition. An Approach from Legal Philosophy

This paper deals with the contributions of the Supreme Court to the democratization of the Mexican political system in the years between 1995 and 2011. It presents the results of a broad research in which I analyzed relevant cases and conducted in-depth interviews with chief justices, researchers and politicians. Although judicial politics has emphasized the role of the judiciary within the political systems, I am interested in studying whether or not the Mexican Supreme Court has contributed to democratic transition from a legal philosophy approach. My argument is that if judges adjudicate based on theories of law, and if theories of law can affect democracy, therefore, courts’ sentences and their philosophical core may have an impact on democracy. This could be of relevance because it operationalizes philosophical categories. Such correlation between theories of law and democracy is reflected on the interpretation used by the Supreme Court. The major conclusion is that when the Supreme Court started to use new forms of argumentation related to natural law, it happened to be a contribution to democracy.