The Politics of Constitutional Rigidity Unveiling Pathways to Change in Mexico

by Velasco-Rivera, Mariana

• ISBN13: 9780192887320
• ISBN10: 0192887327
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2025-09-26
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

What makes a constitution difficult to amend? Many assume it's the stringency of the amendment rules, as seen with the U.S. Constitution. However, Mexico, with similar rules, has one of the most amended constitutions globally. So, if it's not the stringency of the rules, what is it?

The Politics of Constitutional Rigidity: Unveiling Pathways to Change in Mexico focuses on Mexico as a case study to explore the non-institutional factors that influence the relative ease of amendment to its constitution. This book proposes a new analytical framework for understanding constitutional change, suggesting that both formal and informal changes occur within an 'economy of change.' This framework highlights how the interplay of political parties, party systems, constitutional culture, and key political actors' decisions influence political entrenchment.

Timely and original, The Politics of Constitutional Rigidity offers a systematic study of constitutional change and challenges dominant approaches to constitutional rigidity.

Author Biography

Mariana Velasco-Rivera, Assistant Professor in Law, Maynooth University School of Law and Criminology

Mariana Velasco-Rivera is an Assistant Professor in Law at Maynooth University School of Law and Criminology, Ireland. She is also a nonresident scholar at the Center for the U.S. and Mexico at Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. She received her doctoral degree (Doctor of Juridical Science-JSD) and her master's degree (LLM) from Yale Law School. She also holds a law degree (Licenciatura en Derecho) from Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM). Before joining Maynooth University, Dr Velasco-Rivera was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Alexander von Humboldt Chair of Comparative Constitutionalism held by Professor Ran Hirschl at the University of Göttingen, Germany and an Emile Noël Fellow at New York University, School of Law . Before her graduate studies, Mariana clerked for judge José Ramón Cossío Díaz at the Supreme Court of Mexico.