The Justice Cascade: The Evolution and Impact of Foreign Human Rights Trials in Latin America

The 1980s & 1990s saw a shift in major international trends toward enforcing international judicial procedures in an effort to hold individual political actors responsible for crimes against humanity. Further, the embrace of foreign judicial procedures resulted in a "justice cascade" that now applies to all political leaders guilty of past abuses of human rights. It is contended that this cascade of norms is the result of the efforts of a transnational justice advocacy network, comprising connected groups of activist lawyers. The justice cascade is spreading throughout Latin America & other countries, & it is predicted that foreign human rights trials will have an important domestic effect.