Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Lineages of the rule of law / Stephen Holmes -- Power, rules, and compliance / Ignacio Sánchez-Cuenca -- Obedience and obligation in the Rechtsstaat / Michel Troper -- A postscript to "Political foundations of democracy and the rule of law" / Barry R. Weingast -- Why do political parties obey results of elections / Adam Przeworski -- The majoritarian reading of the rule of law / Roberto Gargarella / How can the rule of law rule : cost imposition through decentralized mechanisms / Catalina Smulovitz -- Dictatorship and the rule of law : rules and military power in Pinochet's Chile / Robert Barros -- Courts as an instrument of horizontal accountability : the case of latin Europe / Carlo Guarnieri -- Rule of democracy and rule of law / John Ferejohn and Pasquale Pasquino -- The rule of law as a political weapon / José María Maravall -- The rule of law and the problem of legal reform in Michel de Montaigne's Essais / Biancamaria Fontana.

Addressing why governments sometimes follow the law and other times choose to evade the law, this work defends a positive interpretation where the rule of law results from the strategic choices of relevant actors.