Daniel Brinks has written a superb book by any standard. Theoretically generative, Brinks presents original ways of thinking about access to justice, judicial independence, judicial decision-making, courts, police violence, the legal complex, and inequality before the law. Methodologically rich, the variegated qualitative and quantitative data on five cities in three countries (Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay) allow Brinks to elaborate refined and contingent hypotheses that should spawn research across the world. Pragmatically significant, Brinks shows that democratic politics remain incomplete without protection of core civil rights just as the rule of law rests on particular configurations of politics. This book establishes grounds for a long overdue rapprochement between comparative politics and sociolegal scholarship.