Social Rights Protection and Economic

Abstract

Today we cannot ignore that the first and most important contribution of the 1991 Colombian Constitution was the creation of a new, strong and independent judicial jurisdiction to counterbalance the traditional State power established. Progressively, it has consolidated itself as an example of institutional framework, a circumstance that has led to some integration difficulties. With its controversial case law regarding social rights protection, such a judicial institution has gradually become a true social jurisdiction, which is an unprecedented attitude transformation regarding the importance of fundamental rights in a democratic society. However, doubts about its institutional legitimacy -economy-wise- are being addressed, particularly when sentences establish actual public policies involving large expenditures from the State budget, which economists and a wide number of doctrines don’t seem to necessarily agree with.