The collapse of the state-controlled economies in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe led to an eventual resurgence of the "law and development" movement. This movement placed its main goals and expectations on the use (or abuse) of legal transplants to implement what seemed the only order that should prevail: free-markets and deregulation as driving forces of economies throughout the world.
In Latin America, this “transplant” enthusiasm generated a forced and precipitated introduction to a global competitive economy which resulted in backlashes and what economists now call a “showcase modernity”.
Thus, the main goals of this paper will be to give an integrated perspective on the implications that the end of the Cold War had on Latin America’s development, why the “transplant” efforts failed, and what is still pending in Latin America’s countries to benefit from this experience.
