Columbia's Pablo Piccato Delivers Keynote Address at Law and Society Conference in Chile

Mexico’s homicide rates have soared in the past decade, a situation often attributed to drug trafficking and cartel wars. However, as Columbia's History Professor Pablo Piccato recently explained to a Chilean audience, it is impossible to determine how many of these crimes are drug-related, given that most remain unresolved and unpunished. “It is not feasible to grasp the complexity of the current crisis of violent murders in Mexico, as well as the unresponsiveness of its judicial system, without a long-term understanding of Mexico’s history of crime, truth, and justice,” Piccato stated during a keynote speech at the First Chilean Conference on Law and Society.

The gathering, organized by the Chilean Law and Society Studies Group and sponsored by the Columbia Global Center/Santiago, Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez (UAI), Universidad Alberto Hurtado (UAH), and Universidad Diego Portales (UDP), was held at UAI’s campus in Viña del Mar in mid-August.

Over two days, approximately forty scholars from Chile and other Latin American countries discussed the current state, challenges, and opportunities for developing Law and Society studies in the region. The empirical and interdisciplinary approach to studying law and law-related phenomena has been slow to gain traction in Latin America, particularly in Chile, which has a strongly formalistic legal culture.

The conference brought together a new generation of scholars utilizing perspectives and methods from sociology, anthropology, history, political science, economics, and literature, among others. They aimed to understand how law and judicial institutions operate in practice, how people engage with and interpret these laws, and how they respond or adapt to social change—or fail to do so.

Piccato’s presentation concluded two days of intense discussions. His historical analysis of the reasons behind Mexico’s justice system's failure to address violent crime, and how Mexicans have sought truth and justice through alternative means outside the state, offered an interesting contrast to the situation in Chile. While murder rates in Chile have historically been low and its justice system, despite certain challenges, relatively effective in addressing violent crimes, the divergence between the two countries can be attributed to social, historical, political, and cultural factors.

By providing his historical perspective on Mexico, Piccato offered his Chilean audience valuable insights for comparison and reaffirmed the need to deepen the study of Law and Society throughout Latin America.