The collection consists of research materials that largely relate to the study of judicial systems, legal reform, political institutions, and economic development in Latin America and internationally. The materials are chiefly comprised of official reports, laws and decrees, statistics, and printed matter dating from the late 1990s and early 2000s; there are some digital files and audiovisual materials included as well. In terms of Latin America, there is a significant amount of documentation pertaining to Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, and Venezuela. The more general part of the collection contains reports and studies commissioned by the United Nations, the World Bank, and other bodies, and these focus on transnational issues of corruption, money laundering, and drug trafficking.

The materials in the collection were compiled by Edgardo Buscaglia and William E. Ratliff. Buscaglia is an internationally recognized expert on the judicial systems and economies of Latin America and developing countries. He was a Hoover Institution research fellow from 1991 until 2008 and is currently a Senior Research Scholar in law and economics at Columbia University. Until his death in 2014, William E. Ratliff was the Latin American curator of the Hoover Institution Library & Archives and a Hoover Institution research fellow. He was the author of numerous works on Latin American politics.

25 manuscript boxes, 1 oversize box (10.4 Linear Feet)

For copyright status, please contact the Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

The collection is open for research; materials must be requested in advance via our reservation system. If there are audiovisual or digital media material in the collection, they must be reformatted before providing access.