In the early twenty-first century, courts have become versatile actors in the governance of many constitutional democracies, and judges play a variety of roles in politics and policy making. Assembling papers penned by academic specialists on high courts around the world, and presented during a year-long Andrew W. Mellon Foundation John E. Sawyer Seminar at the University of California, Berkeley, this volume maps the roles in governance that courts are undertaking and the ways they have come to matter in the political life of their nations. It offers empirically rich accounts of dramatic judicial actions in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, exploring the political conditions and judicial strategies that have fostered those assertions of power and evaluating when and how courts' performance of new roles has been politically consequential. By focusing on the content and consequences of judicial power, the book advances a new agenda for the comparative study of courts.

Table of Contents:
Part I. Expanding Judicial Roles in New or Restored Democracies: 1. The politics of courts in democratization: four junctures in Asia Tom Ginsburg; 2. Fragmentation? Defection? Legitimacy? Explaining judicial roles in post-communist 'colored revolutions' Alexei Trochev; 3. Constitutional authority and judicial pragmatism: politics and law in the evolution of South Africa's constitutional court Heinz Klug; 4. Distributing political power: the constitutional tribunal in post-authoritarian Chile Druscilla L. Scribner; 5. The transformation of the Mexican Supreme Court into an arena for political contestation Mónica Castillejos-Aragón; Part II. Expanding Judicial Roles in Established Democracies: 6. Courts enforcing political accountability: the role of criminal justice in Italy Carlo Guarnieri; 7. The Dutch Hoge Raad: judicial roles played, lost, and not played Nick Huls; 8. A consequential court: the US Supreme Court in the twentieth century Robert A. Kagan; 9. Judicial constitution-making in a divided society - the Israeli case Amnon Reichman; 10. Public interest litigation and the transformation of the Supreme Court of India Manoj Mate; 11. The judicial dynamics of the French and European fundamental rights revolution Mitchel de S.-O.-l'E. Lasser; 12. Constitutional courts as bulwarks of secularism Ran Hirschl; Part III. Four 'Provocations': 13. Why the legal complex is integral to theories of consequential courts Terence C. Halliday; 14. Judicial power: getting it and keeping it John Ferejohn; 15. Out of phase: politics, regimes, and regime politics Mark A. Graber; 16. The mighty problem continues Martin Shapiro; 17. Conclusion: of judicial ships and winds of change Diana Kapiszewski, Gordon Silverstein and Robert A. Kagan.