Litigating Socio-Economic Rights in South Africa: A choice between corrective and distributive justice, livre ebook

The South African Constitutional Court has handed down a number of prominent decisions in socio-economic rights cases. The doctrine and modes of legal analysis employed by the Court in these cases have drawn praise from across the world. At the same time, however, the Court has been criticised for the lack of immediate impact of its socio-economic rights decisions, most pertinently on the basis that it has issued weak remedies.In this book, Christopher Mbazira investigates the nature of judicial remedies issued in constitutional litigation in general, and socio-economic rights litigation in particular, to assess this criticism. He argues that the Court’s choice for weaker, generalised remedies rather than strong, individualised remedies can be explained in light of a basic philosophical choice for distributive justice as a remedial guide – a choice that is dictated by the high levels and wide-spread nature of poverty in South Africa.About the editor:Christopher Mbazira is Associate Professor at Makerere University, Coordinator, Public Interest Law Clinic. Visting Professor Wits South Africa