Raul Sanchez Urribarri is an Associate Professor of Legal Studies at the Department of Social Inquiry, La Trobe University. He holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of South Carolina, an LLM from Cambridge University and a Law degree from Universidad Catolica Andres Bello (Caracas). His research focuses on constitutionalism, judicial politics, and the rule of law in comparative perspective. His research on Venezuela has chronicled and analysed the decline of democracy in this country, and has explored the different roles legal institutions have fulfilled over time in an increasingly authoritarian context. He is co-editor of Judicial Activism in Comparative Perspective (with Rich Pacelle and Lori Hausegger, Peter Lang, 2024); Informality and Courts (with Bjoern Dressel and Alex Stroh, Edinburgh University Press, 2025), and Authoritarian Consolidation in Times of Crisis: Venezuela under Nicolas Maduro (with John Polga-Hecimovich). His research has been published in several academic journals, including The Journal of Politics, Law and Social Inquiry, International Political Science Review, Global Constitutionalism, Annual Review of Law and Social Sciences, Latin American Research Review and Third World Quarterly, among others. He is a co-editor at Thesis Eleven (Sage) and a past Chair of LASA’s Section on Venezuelan Studies.
Recent relevant work:
“Courts and Constitutions in an Evolving Autocracy” With David Landau. In Constitutional Democracy in Crisis?, Mark A. Graber, Sanford Levinson, and Mark Tushnet, eds., 2d ed., forthcoming 2026, Oxford University Press. Forthcoming.
“Venezuela’s Extractive Constitutionalism: Between a Nationalized and Privatized Petro-State” with Antulio Rosales. Third World Quarterly. Open access. https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2026.2639442
“Venezuela’s (Un)Rule of Law under Nicolás Maduro”. 2025. With Victoria Capriles. In Authoritarian Consolidation in Times of Crisis. Edited with John Polga-Hecimovich. Routledge, 1-20.
“Conceptual Framework: Assessing Authoritarian Consolidation in Venezuela.” 2025. With John Polga-Hecimovich. In Authoritarian Consolidation in Times of Crisis: Venezuela under Nicolas Maduro. Edited with John Polga-Hecimovich. Routledge, 100-119