Public Choice and the Washington Consensus: The Case of the Peruvian Constitution

Abstract

In this article, the author analyses if the Peruvian constitution is, as it’s commonly referred, the most neoliberal constitution of the Latin American region. For that, he studies the influence of the Washington Consensus in the reform of the Peruvian constitution of 1993. He also studies other factors in that reform, in particular what he calls the ‘other Consensus’, which pursuits other –most social– objectives. After that, he identifies how the reform was implemented, with special emphasis in the influence of the Constitutional Court in Peru. At last, and using the theory of public choice, he analyses three cases that let him conclude that the Peruvian constitution does not respond to a particular ideology but rather to mixed values that can be used by interest groups in an opportunistic manner.

KEYWORDS: Public Choice, Washington Consensus, Peruvian Constitutionalism, insentive, law and economics.

JEL CODE: M13, D71