Ezequiel Gonzalez Ocantos

Ezequiel Gonzalez Ocantos (Ph.D. Notre Dame, 2012) is Associate Professor in the Department of Politics and International Relations and Professorial Fellow of Nuffield College, at the University of Oxford. His primary research agenda is in the field of Comparative Judicial Politics, with a regional focus on Latin America. He has written about judicial behaviour and strategic litigation; transitional justice; judicial dialogue in the Inter-American Human Rights System; and the relationship between courts and public opinion. He is currently studying the causes and consequences of anti-corruption judicial crusades in Latin America, comparing national chapters of the Lava Jato investigation. In addition to his work on courts, Ezequiel Gonzalez Ocantos has published on the political economy of electoral corruption and on qualitative methods. He is the author of two books: Shifting Legal Visions: Judicial Change and Human Rights Trials in Latin America (Cambridge University Press, 2016), winner of the Pritchett Best Book Award from APSA's Law and Courts Section, the best book award from ISA's Human Rights Section, and the Van Cott Best Book Award from LASA's Political Institutions Section; and The Politics of Transitional Justice in Latin America: Power, Norms and Capacity Building (Cambridge University Press, 2020). His peer-reviewed articles have appeared in the American Journal of Political Science, Comparative Politics, Comparative Political Studies, European Journal of Political Research, International Studies Quarterly, Law & Society Review, Journal of Peace Research, Sociological Methods & Research, and The International Journal of Constitutional Law, among others. In 2018 Ezequiel Gonzalez Ocantos won the Philip Leverhulme Prize in Politics and International Relations.

Research interests

Comparative Judicial Politics, Law & Society, Transitional Justice, Corruption, Latin America, Qualitative Methods

Research project pursued at the CEE

During his time at Sciences Po he will be completing a book manuscript on the causes and consequences of anti-corruption judicial crusades in Latin America, with a focus on various national chapters of the Lava Jato (Car Wash) investigation. He will also be starting a new project on judicial nepotism and another on the political determinants of corruption accusations, both using data from Argentina.

To know more

• ezequiel.gonzale@politics.ox.ac.uk
• Link to personal webpage