Reforming the State from Afar: Structural Reform Litigation at the Human Rights Courts

The most recent twist in the story of structural reform litigation is international. To their traditional role of declaring violations and ordering remedies for victims, the European and the Inter-American Courts of Human Rights have added a more ambitious project: the implementation of structural changes at the national level. And, like the U.S. Supreme Court in the school desegregation and prison reform cases, they have begun to encounter their own institutional and political limits. This Article is the first to view the courts’ recent forays into structural reform litigation through a comparative lens. Using Abram Chayes’ classic study of public law litigation in the United States as a springboard, it reveals the reasons for the emergence of structural reform litigation at the transnational level, and the unique strategies the courts use to maintain legitimacy despite stretching their mandates.