We test the extent to which political variables can explain judicial behavior in the Brazilian Supreme Court (STF) when dealing with conflicts between the federal government (namely, the union) and the states. One view argues that we should expect some alignment between the political preferences of the justices and the success of the union primarily due to the appointment mechanism. The opposite view suggests that there should be no systematic alignment between the political preferences of the justices and the success of the union as a consequence of political insulation. We built an original dataset encompassing different types of constitutional actions judged between 1988 and 2010 by the STF. Our research focuses fundamentally on the alignment between revealed judicial preferences when adjudicating cases and presidential appointments in Brazil. We find some evidence that judicial preferences do matter, but the patterns of politicization are weaker than in other similar courts. We also discuss the implications of our findings for comparative judicial politics; in particular, we do not observe strong partisanship.
Specialized courts have been a panacea of legal reform in Europe in the last ten to twenty years. Few studies have studied their performance and alleged advantages. This paper considers a particularly interesting example. It explores possible variations in terms of constitutional review across Brazilian state supreme courts. We focus on possible differences between decisions made by a non-specialized court en banc or by a specialized court panel (órgão especial), the latter being frequent in the larger states. An original dataset was constructed by the authors to empirically explore this question. The dataset considered 630 cases of abstract review judged between January 1, 2006, and December 31, 2010, across twenty-five state supreme courts of the Brazilian federation. The main purpose of our inquiry is to determine whether or not there are significant variations in the outcome of the cases of abstract review as a function of a specialized panel. We find some evidence that the existence of specialized panels matters for the likelihood and rates of dissent as well as duration of procedures, but not for other variables. Implications for legal reform are also discussed.
Foreign investment in the energy sector is complex during the best of times. The challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic (and its intertwined economic crises) increased competition for foreign investment and strengthened the perennial quest for climate justice. The pandemic added complexity to both domestic and international spheres of governance, which led to calls for a suspension or even a cancellation of arbitration claims involving foreign investments. As developing and developed countries compete for financial resources to transition to a carbon-neutral society, such a suspension or cancellation is of academic and practical interest. Accordingly, this article discusses the impact of the pandemic on foreign investment in the energy sector, focusing on investment claims. It assesses competing views involving the proposed revisions (namely, suspensions and cancellations) and their consequences based on a law and economics perspective. This article also examines how foreign investments that align with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals may foster the transition to a greener future. Ultimately, this article offers relevant insights that are likely to be applicable to critical future disruptions, whether they occur due to global economic crises or climate-related emergencies.
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