6 - Socioeconomic Rights in the Colombian Constitutional Jurisprudence

Summary

The Colombian Constitutional Court has decisively undertaken the role of guaranteeing the normative force of economic and social rights. It has devised several tools to that effect, among them a test to evaluate regressive measures. This chapter examines rulings that review statutory norms in the abstract, before arguments that denounce them as illegitimate retrogressions in the enjoyment of social and economic rights. These claims are assessed by applying what we call the “integrated regression test.” The chapter establishes the meaning, structure, operation and efficacy of this test, which uses proportionality analysis as an allocation method. It dissects how it operates to safeguard rights when their minimum core or preexisting associated benefits are withdrawn. The integrated regression test proves to be a strong and complex scrutiny, even if not completely unified in its use, with a wide range of singularities and a tendency to be more protective of social rather than economic rights.