Limited democracy and great distrust: John Hart Ely in Bolivia and Chile

Abstract This article shows that John Hart Ely’s defense of judicial review, as elaborated in his book Democracy and Distrust, has had little influence in Bolivia and Chile. However, that observation does not mean that a theory justifying judicial review when a political market failure is identified is useless for examining both countries’ judicial decisions. The author argues that an Ely-an procedural approach to judicial review can help justify or reject Chilean and Bolivian rulings—or judicial inactions—if certain conditions are taken into account to adapt Ely’s theory to both jurisdictions.