Vol. 36 No. 01 (May 2026) pp. 10-11
JUDICIAL VETOES: DECISION-MAKING ON MIXED SELECTION CONSTITUTIONAL COURTS, by Lydia Tiede. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022. 324pp. Hardback $117.00. ISBN 9781316512319.
Reviewed by Amanda Driscoll, Department of Political Science, Florida State University. Email: adriscoll@fsu.edu.
The process by which judicial authorities are selected sets the stage for judicial autonomy and institutional independence. Institutional rules that govern judicial selection – judicial nominations versus direct election, for example – have long been appreciated as an important factor in judicial decision-making, sentencing, and related judicial behaviors. In her important new book Judicial Vetoes: Decision-Making on Mixed Selection Constitutional Courts, Tiede makes a critical contribution to our understanding of these effects in constitutional courts, demonstrating that selection modality is a stronger predictor of both judicial voting and case outcomes than partisanship or ideological leaning in the constitutional courts of Colombia and Chile.
Most constitutional courts around the world disperse the authority to select constitutional jurists amongst several possible actors. Executive branch authorities, legislative majorities, judicial actors, legal system representatives such as the Ombudsman or Attorneys General, members of civil society or the legal profession all may play a role in the selection or appointment of jurists on mixed-selection constitutional courts. The resulting deliberative body then reflects a confluence of jurists who vary in their training, expertise, experience with and allegiance to the selector to whom they owe their nomination. Allegiances thus divided, these constitutional bodies are ensured their independence, such that they might not be beholden to or captured by any external institution or actor.
Tiede meticulously disassembles the historic and legislative record to trace the origins of the mixed-selection system in Colombia and Chile. She shows that the designers opted for a mixed system to both advance their own institutional interests while also dividing said influence across various loci of power. The actors who vet potential judicial nominees do so with an eye for their own institutional priorities and select adjudicators who will best advance the organizational interest while seated on the bench. Prospective judges, for their part, understand these considerations and behave accordingly both to secure the nomination and then advance said interests while in office, cultivating a reputation that will serve their professional career beyond their term on the constitutional court.
Critically, Tiede theorizes these effects at both the level of the judge and in its aggregate, also considering the possible effects that nominating institutions might have for case disposition at the level of both the panel and the Court. Considering only case outcomes would mask the effect of individual judges’ calculus and votes. Conversely, an exclusive accounting of judicial voting without consideration of final decision-making would obscure the effect of facets of collective decision-making (e.g., panel effects and quorum rules). Both can be decisive for outcomes of constitutional adjudication. The mix of selectorate judges impacts not only how individual judges decide cases but is associated with the frequency of constitutional vetoes in the context of abstract review.
The author’s cross-national research design centers on an original database of judges’ votes on courts’ abstract review decisions rendered between 2006 and 2016 on the Constitutional Tribunal of Chile, and between 1997 and 2014 on the Constitutional Court of Colombia. These two courts are similar in that they are both highly regarded courts, established and extensively reformed in the 1990s-2000s, with similar institutional authority and scope of constitutional power. Yet the political environment in which these magistrates and courts have evolved are very different. Consequentially, the Constitutional Court of Columbia is regarded as a major player in national politics. Meanwhile, the Chilean Constitutional Tribunal (and its magistrates) are famously quiescent in their adjudication style and in striking of national policy. The careful comparison of two courts allows for meticulous analysis and process tracing that is generally infeasible in large-N cross-national studies, while allowing sufficient variation in context and to ensure the claims and argument generalizes beyond a single court, time, or place. Beyond the particulars of these two countries, Tiede’s analysis lays plain the institutional and political conditions that allow for constitutional authorities to individually and collectively strike down government action, which offers compelling insight into the contexts that might allow for checks and balances that the constitutional reformers intended.
This research also charts the course for a next generation of comparative judicial scholarship. Insofar as selectors nominate and appoint jurists with an aim for their own institutional goals and these magistrates behave as agents of their selector, what are the broader consequences for judicial careers and professional development in the legal field? Are there legal or professional enclaves for a particular sort of jurist? Turning instead to questions of policy, does the embedded representation of institutional interests allow for the formation or perpetuation of an “iron triangle” of policy advocacy, wherein the courts (or some corner thereof) become an entrenched fora for interest group representation? As time marches on, the long-term consequences of the representation of policy and institutional interests in these mixed selection courts will be of undoubted interest to a broad base of scholars.
The past generation of Latin American institutionalist scholarship documented variance in presidential powers, legislative institutional arrangements, and electoral selection mechanisms. These scholars have mapped how these institutional features are consequential for elite behavior, political representation and interbranch relations. Tiede’s work joins this cannon, building out insights for judicial institutions both within and beyond the Latin American region. This book is required reading not only for scholars of judicial politics aiming to better understand judicial selection and its varied consequences in separation of powers systems. It is also for anyone interested in how executives, legislators, partisan actors and interest groups may have their influence felt or minimized in the broader constitutional and legal system. Scholars, practitioners, and anyone interested in the intersection of law and politics on the global stage will find Tiede’s book an indispensable resource for many years to come.
REFERENCES:
Tiede, Lydia. 2022. Judicial Vetoes: Decision-Making on Mixed Selection Constitutional Courts. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
© Copyright 2026 by author, Amanda Driscoll.
