This chapter explores how proportionality analysis has been incorporated into the case law of the Chilean Constitutional Court and what role it has played in the review of bills that sought the introduction of transformative policies in the country. The analysis contrasts judicial reasoning in cases that are part of ordinary practice and in landmark rulings where important projects of the progressive agenda were at stake. We suggest that, while proportionality has been applied inconsistently in both ordinary and high-profile cases, in the latter, it becomes part of the different strategies that the Court uses to mediate political conflicts. Proportionality works here more as a rhetorical tool than as a method of judicial reasoning, and the outcomes of the cases seem to depend more on the political composition of the Court at the time of the decision, the strength of citizen demand for changes and the influence that interest groups exert on the Court.

The depersonalization of the courts encouraged by the civil law tradition makes it less likely that judges in those types of jurisdiction will become towering or, at least, makes their influential jurisprudence anonymous or less visible. By exploring the experience of Eugenio Valenzuela, a Chilean judge who served on the Constitutional Court in the 1980s, this chapter shows that, despite the limitations of the civil law tradition, sometimes it is nonetheless possible to identify a towering judge in a civil law country. The author studies how Valenzuela led a group of judges within the Chilean Constitutional Court and succeeded in challenging critical pieces of legislation enacted by the military Junta during the Pinochet dictatorship. By showing how the Valenzuela jurisprudence helped to advance the transition to democracy against the interests of the authoritarian regime, the chapter claims that founding moments in fragile institutional settings of civil law countries may provide an opportunity for a political towering judge to emerge.